


One Way Ticket Now Returned

by richcreamerybutter



Series: Con Charlie Con Dio [1]
Category: Ghost (Sweden Band)
Genre: Accidental Cuddling, Angst, Breakup, Canon Compliant, Dressing Room Sex, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Glossed over, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Kissing, Major character death - Freeform, Makeup Sex, Mental Breakdown, Other, Public Display of Affection, Reconciliation, Sex, Sharing a Bed, Slow Burn, Slow Romance, because I love him that way, eventually, hinted at - Freeform, imposter syndrome, soft papa
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-14
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:08:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 25
Words: 46,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25901107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/richcreamerybutter/pseuds/richcreamerybutter
Summary: Charlie's a student in London with a side hustle selling merch at a local venue. When Ghost bring their Popestar Tour to the UK a chance encounter with a Papa looking to escape on the quiet evolves into a new, more exciting side hustle - or a new, more exciting way of life altogether?Charlie's gender is deliberately never specified, which I've never tried before! So if you spot a stray pronoun or something please do let me know.
Relationships: Papa Emeritus III/Original Character(s)
Series: Con Charlie Con Dio [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2079072
Comments: 68
Kudos: 61





	1. Prequel

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by two ideas:
> 
> 1\. The time I was waiting at a loading bay with a small group of quiet, sensible fans while a larger group of loud, rude fans rattled fences and yelled at certain unmasked musicians who, needless to say, didn't respond;  
> 2\. I wanted someone to be emotionally invested enough in Terzo for the end of Meliora to have an impact on them.
> 
> Let's see how we get on?

This was my favourite part of any night at work. The part between finishing the merch display and the public coming to wreck the merch display, when everything still looked perfect.

Unless there was a band on that I liked, of course. But tonight, I didn't know a right lot about the band that were on. I was fully expecting the greasy, double-denim, long-hair-but-balding-on-top types tonight, judging by their shirt designs. Edgy logo with an upside-down crucifix making a 't' and a load of corpse paint imagery.

'D'you know much about Ghost?' I said to Laura. Colleague and flatmate. We were closer than siblings, but it was a good thing she was studying graphic design and I was a computer scientist, else we'd have fallen out much like actual siblings. 'I don't think I could name one of their songs.'

'I don't know _much,_ ' Laura said. 'They're like … this great big Satan church, though. I think you'd like them actually.'

'Satan church? Are you serious?'

'I know, it sounds stupid. The trick is not to take it too seriously.' She pulled at one of the shirts I'd hung up, a sort of brown chessboard with some figure standing over it. 'And the singer is _gorgeous._ '

'He's a skeleton?'

Laura rolled her eyes. 'He's not a _skeleton._ He's just wearing corpse paint. Seriously, it's hot. You'll see what I mean when they come on.'

We didn't always get to have a proper look at the bands, if we were really busy. I shrugged. 'Yeah, all right.'

*

I had to admit, the whole thing impressed me way more than I'd expected it to.

For one thing, the fans were great. There are some rock shows full of people just being plain rude, or even aggressive, in the name of 'moshing' or whatever, but there seemed to be an atmosphere about Ghost that took everyone over. And everyone really did seem to mean _everyone_. Little kids, dad-rock types, young women in tiny skirts, one or two people in full papal robes … this band attracted the full gamut of music fans.

For another thing – well. They deserved to.

I didn't know a single song but I was drawn so fully into the set that I vowed to go and check them out as soon as I got home. Rarely had I seen such a tight live band. Rarely had I seen musicians have such fun on-stage. And never had I seen a frontman quite like this one.

'What's the main guy called?' I said to Laura during a brief lull in one song – the singer was on his knees serenading a woman at the front of the crowd, her hand in his white glove.

'Papa Emeritus. The third.'

'Not the first?'

'No. They change every couple of years or so.'

God. This whole thing was bizarre – and I was getting well into it.


	2. The Forum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another short one! Exposition and all that! I promise they will get more chunky as the story progresses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tl;dr - we meet him. And that's about it.

There's always a crush afterwards, which is hard work when your ears are ringing and you have at least twelve people yelling at you at any one time. The best part about this is that it goes quickly. The worst part is literally everything else.

There was sweat gleaming on Laura's forehead by the time things started to quieten down. Security guards were ushering people outside so we only had the last few stragglers to deal with, but knowing you're almost at the end of something makes you slack off, doesn't it? It's the same with uni work. “Oh, I've only got five hundred words of this assignment to write – I've definitely earned at least a bottle of the cheapest wine the Co-Op on the corner can offer.” Laura looked pretty strained when we both reached for the same medium-sized shirt pile and she caught my eye, raising her eyebrows.

'Would you absolutely kill me if I went to the loo right now?' she said. 'I've had my legs crossed for about half an hour …'

I rolled my eyes. 'Can you not wait five more minutes?'

'I one hundred per cent can't. I will literally piss all over this merch. I'm sure you don't want to be held responsible for that.'

'I'm not your parent, if you piss all over this merch then you'll only have yourself to blame,' I said, but I nodded in the direction of the toilets. 'I think we're almost done anyway.'

She took the cash off the woman who'd bought the shirt before scooting off.

She was ages. I dunno if she was using the loo as an excuse to sit on her phone or if it was just really busy in there, but I ended up serving the last few people in the queue on my own and even starting on taking the merch down. All that hard work setting the stand up was only good for a few hours. Stupid, really. But there weren't many other jobs I would rather have done when I really thought about it.

My view of the stage now completely clear, I leant back against the display board for a moment to have a good look at it. There were roadies up there now, taking down all the backdrops and amps and monitors and all that sort of thing. Did it ruin the magic? A bit. But I was used to it now, used to seeing all the background work that goes into a couple of hours of concert. I was used to being part of it, too. Maybe I didn't put as much graft in as a roadie but it was graft all the same. Even if I did get to see stunning showcases like Ghost for free …

'Excuse me?'

I hadn't been aware there was anyone left to buy shirts. I readjusted my focus to see a man standing in front of the merch stall. My lower jaw loosened, in danger of scraping my collarbone, before I could stop it.

He was shorter, somehow, close up. No less imposing, even when he was just standing there looking at you. I managed a couple more seconds of gormless staring, taking in his skull paint and the mismatched eyes I hadn't been able to see when he'd been singing, before he snapped his fingers in front of my face. He was still wearing white gloves, but he made a sharp crack anyway.

'Yes,' I said, trying to mentally shake my head. 'Are you OK?'

Papa Emeritus the Third looked around the nearly-empty venue before leaning into me slightly, as though the space around us were as likely to overhear him as actual people would've been.

'D'you want to get out of here?'


	3. Wembley Way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Papa's intentions become clear, and they're not as untoward as Charlie was worried about. In fact, nothing about this man is quite what it seemed.

All right, so I let myself gape at him on purpose that time. The last time some bloke had said “d'you want to get out of here?” to me had been in Underworld, and he'd made his intentions dead clear with the horrible leer he'd been flashing me at the same time. I very much hadn't wanted to get out of there and I'd told him so. Laura had had to protect me from him for the rest of the night.

This didn't feel like that. For one thing, I wasn't dancing badly to Paramore, and for another, Papa wasn't leering. If anything, he looked concerned, and he kept glancing behind him as though he'd recently escaped kidnappers.

'Erm –' I gave myself another couple of seconds to think. _Think,_ dammit. 'What d'you mean?'

'Sorry,' he said. 'I did not make myself clear. I wonder if you can help me to leave the venue without being accosted?'

Admittedly I wasn't a stalwart on the merch stand, but this was the first time an artist had ever approached me to help them escape their fans, and I eyed him in confusion. 'I … suppose we could go out the front door?' I said. I tried not to make it sound like I was stating the obvious, but I definitely sounded like I was. 'Are there loads of people waiting for you, like?'

He made a gesture with a hand that looked like it was meant to mean 'sort of'. 'It's not that there are _loads_ of people,' he said. 'Just that there are … certain people … I would rather not deal with tonight. Ordinarily I love to meet my fans after rituals. Most of them are so excited to tell me how much fun they had. And I'm sorry to let those ones down tonight, but there are some who just see me as a sort of trophy. You can tell by how many collectibles they're carrying. They want me to sign every single one simply to sell on, and they make it even worse by pretending they're my friends while I do it. No, I'm not in that mood tonight. I need to be somewhere … _quiet._ ' He let out a long, slow breath. 'Are you from London?'

'I live here?'

'That's enough. Take me somewhere quiet.'

I wasn't sure if that was within my jurisdiction as a merch seller. I glanced around for Laura but there was still no sign of her. Would she be really mad if I left the entire cleanup operation to her? Stupid that that was what I considered first. She would definitely be mad that I'd run off with the singer she'd just called hot and that I, until tonight, had never heard of.

But Laura wasn't in front of me. That singer was.

'All right,' I said. 'There'll still be people around. Let's blend you in with them.'

Checking that nobody superior was watching, I found a shirt I thought might fit him, and he took his jacket off to pull it on. It looked daft over his long white sleeves.

'Here –' I had my hoodie stashed away behind me, and I chucked it to him, hoping it didn't smell too musty. I couldn't remember the last time we'd dragged baskets down to the laundrette. 'Put that on. I'll take your jacket for now …' I ran a hand along one of the soft, slick sleeves. 'Jesus. Was this expensive?'

'Very.'

'I'll be careful.' Hoping we'd just look like two mega-fans, I slid it on. It was almost too small. 'Right. You still look very much like you, though. Can you mess your hair up a bit? And lose the gloves, for God's sake.'

'We're not a fan of that guy here,' Papa said. I couldn't tell if he was attempting a joke, but he took his gloves off, so I left it at that.

One more try at waiting for Laura. None of the people in the vicinity looked anything like her.

'Can we wait one second while I text –?'

'Can you do that on the way?' The audacity of this man should've irritated me. Well, it did. A bit. But there was an inherent authority to him that made me leave my phone in my jeans pocket.

I had a vague idea of where I was going to take him, but the reality of it was something else. I said a brief goodnight to the security guards on the door and none of them batted an eyelid at the fact that the person I was leaving with tonight appeared to be the world's biggest Ghost fan and not the girl I actually lived with.

'We'll go to Camden Town, it'll be easier,' I said.

'Camden? I know Camden. Won't that be rather busy at this time of night?'

'I haven't found a quiet bit of Zone 2 yet. But that's not our final destination. Don't worry.'

Don't worry? What did I have to reassure this guy about? He was strutting beside me as though he'd been born and bred here. I had no idea if he recognised my very-much-not-London accent but if he hadn't brought it up I wasn't going to tell him. Somehow, I was terrified of letting him down. He'd trusted me. For some wild reason.

He was very quiet on the tube. I took the opportunity to text Laura, not knowing when my phone was going to pick up enough service to actually send it to her. _Something came up. I'm so sorry. I'll see you at the flat later and explain everything, I promise xxx_

'We're going to change at Waterloo and then it's another twenty-five minutes,' I said. 'Is that all right?'

He just waved his hand. 'The further, the better.'

That was all we really said. I don't know about him, but I was having a tricky time trying to process the fact that I was riding the tube with some kind of satanic preacher like it was no big deal, and the idea of actually speaking to him seemed to make things even weirder. I didn't even look at him, instead staring at the adverts above the opposite seats. People drifted off at every stop. One or two got on, and I tried not to look at them but I was pretty sure every single one of them looked at us.

We got off at Waterloo and, again, he just let me steer him. All the way to Wembley Park. Where I lived.

Oh, hell. My thinking had been that once he was done with whatever he fancied doing in a quiet place, I could get home quickly and safely and cause Laura as little worry as possible. Now, though, I wondered whether that might have been the worst idea ever. I could usually tell when I needed to be careful around a stranger, and somehow I didn't feel like this guy was a threat. Not yet, anyway. But when I really, really thought about it, taking someone like him so close to our flat …

I loved Wembley Way, though. Not in a football sense. In fact, I found it hard to imagine the walkway crowded with people in matching shirts, drunkenly shouting and singing. It was probably exciting if you were invested in it, but from where I was sitting – the flat, normally – it was too _obvious._ And knowing half the people were going to come away bitter or angry took the fun of the whole thing away a little bit. I much preferred the view when there was a show on at the arena. The buzz was different. Quieter but intense. And the good mood afterwards? It was always palpable, in everyone.

Thank God there was hardly anyone around tonight.

'This is … _the_ Wembley?' It sounded nicer in his Italian accent. He was looking around as we descended from Wembley Park and I knew what he was picturing. It didn't look like that at night. There were people, of course there were, but not the floods of matchdays. They were dressed up for bars or they were heading home. In pairs or alone, minding their own business against the silhouette of the stadium and its arch.

'It's New Wembley. Some people are quite upset that it isn't the same stadium.'

'And this is the quiet place you had in mind?'

I nodded, with a huge inhale. 'Yep. I know. It was a stupid idea …'

But he was speeding up, walking away from me so that I wasn't sure he'd even registered what I'd said. I didn't try to catch him up. I was pretty sure he didn't want to be caught up. He just strode away, under the bridge, and I could see him lit up by the multi-coloured lights as he stopped dead and looked right up.

Alone, I felt ridiculous in his stupid shiny coat. I couldn't stop myself lengthening my strides slightly. I wanted to be near him, to not be the only one who stuck out in this open space.

He had his eyes closed when I approached him, but he must have heard me.

'Perfect,' he said, in a low voice. 'Thank you.'

I didn't understand how on Earth the bridge near Wembley Park station could be 'perfect'. Thinking about it, I could have taken him to all sorts of places in London. It was overwhelming to me still but I knew there were proper quiet spots, as quiet as central London gets at least. But I wanted to be near home. And, I had to admit, I'd been panicking a bit. It's not every day someone like _him_ makes demands like that of you.

'Are you OK?' I had to ask.

He took several deep breaths. He was still staring at the underside of the bridge, his face paint eerie under the multi-coloured lights.

'I need time to feel like myself again after a ritual,' he said. 'The person you see on stage is not necessarily the person I am in real life, but so many people think that we are one and the same, huh? It is … dangerous. I'm a performer up there. I'm not _me._ '

'Then who are you?'

Finally, he turned to me with a lopsided smile.

'You don't need to know that. You've done enough tonight.'

'I feel like it's _because_ I've done this that I do need to know that.'

'Did you not listen to me? I'm not a performer. I'm just a … a guy, I guess. Don't even worry. You would not be missing out if you didn't get to know me.'

'So when I go home tonight I'll just have to lie in bed wondering who the enigmatic Papa Emeritus the Third was?'

'Hmm.' He folded his arms. 'I don't remember telling you my name.'

'My friend told me. She knew all about you.'

'She did not. I can promise you that.'

God, this was getting ridiculous. The more mystery bullshit he spouted, the more I knew I shouldn't be buying into it - and the more I wanted to talk to him about it.

'Speaking of my friend, she might be home by now,' I said. 'I should probably head, too. She'll be wondering where I am, she won't believe I've been with you.'

'Is she a fan of mine?'

'She is.'

'She can keep the jacket, then.' He looked at me for a moment. 'Or you can, if you feel as though tonight has been slightly unbelievable.'

'Slightly' was an understatement and a half. I pulled the jacket more tightly around me. Out of almost nowhere, I'd realised it was actually pretty cold. March was a funny month for that. You never really knew what you were getting in England.

'Will you be OK getting back to … wherever you need to be?' I said.

'Oh, do not worry about me,' he waved his hand absently. 'I'm more concerned about you. Do you need walking home?'

I jerked my head further down Wembley Way. 'I'm just down there.'

'You live in Wembley! I am impressed. And surprised that you trusted me enough to take me almost to your front door without even knowing me. I hope I haven't disappointed.'

'In all fairness, Papa, you haven't really done anything, have you?'

He studied me, resting his hands on his hips. Maybe I'd pushed him too far. 'What's your name?'

Why did I hesitate? I wasn't sure if I couldn't think of a fake name fast enough, or whether I simply didn't want him to know what my name was. If I missed a beat, though, he didn't seem to notice. 'It's Charlie.'

'It's been a wonderful evening, Charlie.' No, no indication that I'd done or said anything unusual. I felt a tension I hadn't known was there ease off.

'Well. I wish I could have made it more wonderful somehow. Maybe next time we'll get some mozzarella dippers from McDonald's or something after the show, hm?'

'Or maybe next time I will show you real mozzarella.' He turned away, waving his hand again. 'Next time, Charlie. Next time.'

In that moment, watching him walk back towards Wembley Park in the hoodie I'd meant to take back off him, I knew he was right. I knew that as out of the blue as the evening had been, there was probably going to be another one at some point. Whether that be a show I went to of my own accord or another show I was working, I had the feeling he was going to remember me if he saw me again.

And I was sure as hell going to remember him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK, so this story was inspired in part by a bunch of autograph hunters hassling a certain someone after a show I went to last year - I wish I could've made it obvious that my friends and I weren't there to hassle him and I still feel bad about that night! Writing this was cathartic in a way. Sort of like my atonement or something ...


	4. Toast of London

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The evening's events, when relayed to Laura, sound pretty stupid.

I could smell hot buttered toast as I approached our door – Laura had indeed beaten me home. I realised I hadn't looked at my phone since we'd been on the Tube. I might well have missed a thousand angry messages and, two seconds from actually seeing Laura, it was too late to rectify that. I took a deep breath before opening the door, expecting to be bombarded with furious and relieved profanities, but she was sitting on the sofa with two slices of the toast I'd smelled, watching something dire-looking on our TV. We used the 'you don't have a TV licence' letter as a sort of place mat. At the sound of the door closing behind me, she turned her head.

'All right?'

I stopped in my tracks. 'Aren't you like – really mad at me?'

She just turned back to the TV. 'You wouldn't have abandoned me unless you'd had good reason. Was he hot?'

'He –' I'd been so flustered I hadn't realised she was joking. 'Shut up, it wasn't anything like that. I don't think.'

'You don't think?'

She swivelled again, this time with her whole body. I exhaled hard and moved towards the toaster, suddenly craving carbs. A McDonald's stop might have been a good idea after all. The only bread left was end pieces and I had to wrestle them into the toaster with hands I hadn't realised had been shaking.

'Jesus, Charlie. What's gone on? When you said something had "come up" in your message I thought you might've been making a crass joke.'

'No, I was literally just saying that I had to deal with something …'

Mmmmm. Yeah, toast was the way forward. It smelled good already. It was a shame there wasn't more bread left, I was starting to feel as though I could've eaten half a loaf.

'What's happened?' Laura said. She'd dropped the jovial tone now, and even as she spoke she muted the TV. 'You're being really weird and it's getting scary.'

I swallowed. 'It was kind of weird. I ended up going off with Papa Emeritus.'

Whatever she'd been expecting me to offer by way of explanation, it wasn't that.

'You went off with …? What, the actual one? Not some fan dressed up as him?'

My toast popped up, or at least it tried to. I had to wrestle it out, spraying charred crumbs all over the counter top.

'Yes, the actual one,' I said, indicating his jacket. I let her ruminate on that as I buttered the now-burnt wodges of bread I'd forced into the toaster. I couldn't have this conversation at such a distance any more. I needed to gauge her reaction, especially as she knew more about this band – and man – than I did. What had happened might have been a common occurrence in the world of Ghost. Her face, though, when I sat on the sofa beside her, hinted that it probably was not. 'He came up to me while you were in the bathroom asking if I'd help smuggle him away from the show so he could go and chill out a bit. So … I did.'

'Why would he do that?' The TV went off and Laura abandoned the remote and her toast, folding her arms and staring me down. It wasn't accusatory, more confused.

So I told her everything, and in doing so, realised there really wasn't much to tell. How we'd swapped clothes around a bit, how we'd ridden to Wembley, and how much he'd seemed to enjoy the relative tranquillity of the area after the show. I took off the jacket and Laura held onto it like a comforter. I think she'd been expecting something much more fantastical, and when I finished the story, she left a few seconds of silence hanging between us before realising that that, indeed, was that. And when she did, she took very specific issue.

'You brought him all the way here? But not - here?' 

I almost started. 'No! Ew. No, he literally just wanted to clear his head. I think if I'd tried to be the screaming fan he'd've bailed. I just did what he asked me, Laura, he was pretty persuasive.'

'But that is so unfair!' she wailed. 'I'm the one who proper fancies him yet you're the one who gets to actually hang out with him one on one?'

There was a twinge of guilt at that, I had to admit. 'I know. I'm sorry. Maybe it should've been you. I tried to get him to wait but he was pretty insistent on getting away so I just had to text you.'

'Bloody hell.' Laura stared at her toast for a moment. 'But if he really was wanting to get away it's probably best he met you and not me, I suppose. I might've scared him off … go on, then. What was he like?'

I thought back over the evening, which I was starting to suspect might have been a fever dream. His intensity was what stood out, all the way through. From the moment he'd approached me at the merch table to the way he'd promised me mozzarella as he swept away from me. Deadpan. He might even have been kidding. I would no doubt spend the next few nights lying awake in bed mulling that over.

'I guess he wasn't that different from what he was like when we watched him,' I said slowly. 'Except less sensual. He didn't do any of that swirling around or seductive stuff but he was just as smooth? And it was really hard to defy him. I feel like he could almost have asked anything of me and it would've made sense and I would've done it.'

'There's not a lot I wouldn't do for him, to be fair,' Laura said, wiggling her eyebrows. 'But of everything he could've wanted … I mean, could he not just have got on a random tube until there weren't any people on it any more? Or asked a local, if he had to ask someone?'

'Weirdly, I don't think his knowledge of English regional accents is in-depth enough to be able to tell mine originates nearly three hundred miles north of London,' I said. 'I couldn't tell you whereabouts in Italy he was from, after all. And I did my job, didn't I? He liked it here. He promised he was going to buy me cheese. Maybe that's his idea of a fair trade?'

'I did believe you, but now you're just being ridiculous,' Laura chuckled. 

I just bit into my cooling toast. The two weren't mutually exclusive, after all.


	5. Wildest Dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie's back to life, back to reality and knee-deep in deadline hell. But a face from the previous bizarre night resurfaces.

The biggest drawback to having a job like ours was the constant up and down of gig highs and adrenaline hangovers. There's something special about being among a lot of people having fun together so that even if we worked a band we weren't interested in, we always walked away from the Forum in a sort of haze, and we rarely found it easy to drop off to sleep straight away afterwards – whatever we had at uni the next day.

For me, it was coursework. I had no idea if departments talked to each other but I had three deadlines at once, so it was either a nasty joke or complete ignorance on their part. It didn't matter, at the end of the day. I still had to do it all.

I didn't have much on in the way of actual lectures that day, though, so at the very least I could hunch over my laptop in the grossest old clothes with a huge latte from Costa and the judgement of Laura to motivate me. She, too, had coursework to work on, but hers looked about a thousand times more exciting. Graphic designers are quite exciting in general, to be fair. They've got those sort of brains, haven't they? Everything's an opportunity for beauty.

'Sometimes,' I said, when I'd run out of motivation about half an hour after I'd started work, 'I wish I'd chosen almost any other degree.'

She adjusted the position of the single cigarette she was taking reference photos of. I think it was some sort of anti-smoking campaign she was working on for her coursework rather than some edgy piece. 'You're going to get a well good job at the end of all this, though. With well good money. I'm getting absolutely nothing out of this but pleasure, and to be honest I'm not even sure there's much of that left in it right now.'

'It _is_ deadline season,' I reminded her, but I knew exactly what she meant. We were both in our second years, so we were both about half way through undergraduate degrees, and I was pretty sure that you were supposed to be sold on your pathway once you got to that point in your education. Laura, despite her frustration at taking approximately one million photos of the same cigarette, loved graphic design. Despite her frustration at her job prospects she managed to freelance on the side of the massive amounts of work she did for uni, and she was making a name for herself already. Despite sharing a tiny flat with her best friend, she was definitely going to have a proper, grown-up life once we graduated. No matter how hard I tried, though, I couldn't visualise myself ever wanting to analyse a bit of data ever again. I was good enough at it, and I knew it was an employable degree, but part of me rather fancied making a career out of selling t-shirts in Kentish Town …

'Yeah, I guess so,' Laura said, shaking me out of a daydream in which a skeletal figure gyrated on the Forum's stage. I just shut my laptop.

'Right. Five minute leg stretch, then back to it,' I said. I'd learned, at least, to recognise when I'd run out of working momentum, and even more importantly I'd learned how to restore it.

I pulled a decent coat over my horrible outfit before strutting out of the flat and down the stairs, with the full intention of walking around the bottom of our building once then going straight back upstairs. When I got to the lobby, though, there was a familiar figure in conversation with the guy behind the security desk.

At first, I didn't think it could be him. No way would he wear that outfit in the middle of the day. No way would he go into a strange apartment building in full skull paint.

Then, I realised that of course he bloody would.

'Are you here for me?' I said tentatively.

Both Papa Emeritus and the security guard – Dhiraj today, who gave me a nervous wave – looked over at me, standing in my skanky loungewear in the lobby.

'He's gotta be, hasn't he?' said Dhiraj. 'You or your flatmate. I can't think of anyone else I've met here who'd know a guy like you. No offence,' he added, but Papa merely waved a hand. A gloved hand. Bloody hell.

'I wondered if I might speak to you, Charlie,' Papa said, directly to me now. 'Forgive me for simply turning up at your place of residence –'

'Yeah, that's a bit weird, I'm not gonna lie,' I said, folding my arms. 'How did you find me?'

'The clergy have our ways,' Papa said. 'I promise, if you hadn't wanted to see me I would have left well enough alone and never bothered you again. Do you want to see me?'

'Well. That all depends on why you've come to see me. You aren't holding my hoodie so I assume you've not come to bring that back?'

Papa glanced around the lobby, empty except for us. Thank God. 'I knew there was something! No, I'm sorry. I will indeed have that returned to you in time. But for now, I have a proposition for you, Charlie. A thoroughly decent proposition, I promise. But I thought I might meet your friend, too … Laura, I believe? If she is indeed a fan …'

I swallowed. Laura was obviously upstairs but she, too, was dressed in standard, comfortable hunched-over-coursework attire. I didn't even have my phone on me to send her a warning message. 'She would love to meet you,' I said. 'Do you want to come up to our flat? Have you signed in?'

'He's good to go,' Dhiraj said. I think he was just relieved at the idea of getting shot of this bizarre human being – if he was a human being. Even I was starting to wonder.

I didn't know what to say to him as I led him upstairs. I took him in the lift to minimise the amount of time we had to spend together, out of terror of an awkward silence. It _was_ silent, mostly. There wasn't much awkwardness, though. He seemed to want to wait until we were in private to talk, and suspecting as much, I didn't feel a need to fill the space between us. He filled the lift with a presence all his own anyway.

I made sure I went in first, because I was desperate to see Laura's face when she saw him.

'Laura? We have a visitor,' I called. She'd stopped taking photos of the cigarette now, but her desk was still covered in various coloured backgrounds she'd been using, and she was clicking away in Adobe, muttering to herself.

'Oh?'

She was not ready. Immediately, I knew she was cursing the state of the flat, the state of her hair and the state of herself in general. There was a moment in which she didn't move, just stared, and I could visualise every single regret processing in her mind. Then she sprung to her feet to stride over to us with a huge smile. I didn't miss the frenzied hand that started trying to comb through her hair, though. 'Hey,' she said, 'we were selling shirts at your ritual last night, it was wonderful. Apparently you ended up hanging out with my good friend Charlie afterwards.'

I had to admit, I was impressed with her chill.

'Your good friend Charlie was very useful to me,' Papa said. 'I'm sure you would have been too, Laura.'

OK. At her name, she went silent, her chill melted into a sticky puddle.

'That's why I've come here, actually,' Papa said. 'Can I –?'

He gestured vaguely at the dining table, still sporting my laptop and textbooks as well as a tabletop turntable. 'Oh, of course, sit down,' I said. 'Drink?'

'What sort of coffee do you have?'

'For God's sake give him the good coffee,' Laura said, as though he weren't sat right beside us. 'Sorry. We have like … peasant coffee for when we just want to stay awake, but we also have good coffee because we can be pretty snobby about it when we want to be.'

I saw his eyes light up when I retrieved our Illy jar. It gave a me a little thrill, somehow, knowing that something as ordinary as coffee could penetrate that intimidating mask of paint and plain speaking. Laura helpfully took her mug back to her laptop when it had brewed, leaving Papa and I in relative privacy.

'Good coffee indeed,' he said. 'OK, Charlie. I have kept you wondering long enough. I'm here to offer you employment.'

I must have stared at him for a full five seconds. When I realised what I was doing, I sort of twitched my mouth into a smile in an attempt to make up for what must have been a horrified gape. 'I'm sorry, what?'

'I want you to work for me. I think you could be a valuable asset to the clergy on the road, after last night. You have such a level head. Unfortunately I cannot say that for many others in the ministry.'

'But … like … as what? I don't understand. I'm just a student who sells merch at night. There'll be other people doing that stuff for you at the other venues, won't there?'

'No, I do not mean for you to continue selling t-shirts. I mean as my … how shall I phrase this?' He paused for a thoughtful few sips of coffee. 'Ah. I mean as a sort of personal assistant, I suppose. Although in less an administrative sense. We have laity for that. More in a _personal_ sense. You were the exact right person to bring me back to myself last night, and trust me, it can be difficult to find myself again after I have just performed. I think that process would be incredibly efficient if you were there to help me along with it every night.'

He wasn't saying it like it was any kind of a big deal. He picked his coffee up again, surveying me over the top of the cup as I sat back, lost in thought.

'Let me make sure I fully understand what you're asking me,' I said slowly. 'You want me to come on tour with you so that after the shows – rituals?' He nodded. 'Yeah. After the rituals I can take you to some tacky bridge or somewhere in the city you're playing in where you won't be bothered by fans. Which, let's face it, is something you could research yourself, in advance, for free.'

'It isn't just about the place, though. I keep telling you. It's about the mindset. About bringing me back to myself – which is hard when I do not feel like I have been myself all evening. Someone like you, someone external, is in the best position to remind me of who I am, because you do not have any preconceived ideas of who you think I am supposed to be.'

I had to resist giving him another incredulous stare. After all, when a suave Italian Satan priest in full skull paint comes to your flat, you're going to have some preconceived ideas about him, aren't you?

Even so, I had to admit that what he'd said made sense. I'd never been a rock star, of course. I'd rarely even said two words in front of a group of people save for uni presentations that didn't really count. But I could understand the feeling of other people misunderstanding who you really were. There were still too many people who thought I was a studious, intelligent human being with a decent life and career plan.

'Do you have a written contract you can offer me?' I heard myself say it before I realised I'd said it. Employment jargon sounded ridiculous when bringing it up to him, but his eyes widened in interest.

'So you are considering it?'

I had deadlines, but every single one was going to be through Turnitin. As long as he let me take my laptop and textbooks, there was no reason I couldn't get on with my coursework while we were on the road. I had the odd lecture here and there left of the term but not enough that if I missed them all anyone would care _too_ much. I could pull a sickie for the rest of term. Claim stress. It wouldn't be the biggest lie in the world. My job at the Forum was a casual thing anyway so there was nothing spoiling there if I missed a few shifts. This, to be fair, was like a massive upgrade of that job. If I understood him rightly.

I let out a long, hard exhale. 'I suppose I am,' I said.

In my periphery, I saw Laura smile.


	6. On the Road Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Short! Charlie, plagued with self-doubt, sets off to Leeds.

When I was a kid, I used to read by the flashes of streetlights in the back of the car when my parents had driven at night. Sitting in a coach trekking up the A1 filled me with a strange sort of nostalgia for that time, except instead of trying to catch snatches of a book in the fleeting lights I was gazing out at them, hypnotised. No way was my mind focused enough to read. All around me, people were asleep – well. People and ghouls. I wasn't entirely sure if they were people, and honestly, it felt rude to ask. I pulled out my phone for the tenth time that minute, noticed the time obviously hadn't changed since I'd last checked (ten past one in the morning), then slid it back into my pocket. I couldn't even find the brainpower to mess around on it. Tonight was too …

I didn't even know. Exciting? Nerve-wracking? There's a fine line between the two. Bloody ridiculous, really, would've encapsulated it better. Running away from my best friend and university to follow a band of people I didn't know.

Laura had been so good as we'd embraced for a brief goodbye.

'I thought you'd be jealous,' I'd confessed into her shoulder, and she'd laughed.

'I _am_ jealous,' she'd said. 'Fiercely jealous. But that's exactly why you're the right person for this job and not me. He doesn't want a fangirl, he wants you.'

'He' wasn't on this bus. He rode with higher-up, more important members of the church, I assumed to discuss their rituals and outreach and that sort of thing. For the first time, I wished I understood religion a bit better. It hadn't occurred to me until then that I was, in effect, employed by a church.

 _He couldn't want me._  
  
He was going to find out that this whole idea was bogus after approximately half an hour with me after the next ritual. It was, at least, going to work in my favour in that we were heading to Leeds. My accent would sound a lot less alien there, and I knew where to get him the best Indian food and the best pie and the best coffee. I also had vague ideas of the post-ritual wander we were going to go on, and this time there wasn't an awkward tube journey standing in the way.

But aside from that, I'd been racking my brains and I couldn't come with anything unusual I could offer him that he wouldn't be able to do for himself. His attempted explanation of my calming presence was the only reasoning he kept offering, but I wasn't convinced that was enough to necessitate creating a new job for a stranger mid-tour.

He was paying me. He had, indeed, drawn up a contract. A brief thing, but one that made my role of his PA official in a sense. I would support him after rituals, and he would pay me for it, throughout the European leg of this tour.

I leant back against my headrest with a sigh. Even with a contract, I was going in without fully understanding what I'd signed up to. I doubted I would ever be considered important enough to ride on the proper clergy tourbus, but in that moment, I could really have done with listening in on some sort of conversation that revealed a bit more about this mysterious band.

Band? Could I even call it that?

The ghouls were unbothered by my inner turmoil. All asleep, snoring in varying degrees. I wasn't entirely sure whether their pointed, smooth faces were their true forms or masks. At this point, things were so bizarre that neither would have surprised me in the slightest.

I must have got some sleep, in the end, because when the coach pulled up behind the Academy I sort of snorted and sat upright with a start, but I didn't feel as though I'd had any kind of rest. It was still early. I'd been expecting to arrive at a hotel and the generic back road beside me didn't offer me much hope for catching up on the sleep I'd lost.

I followed the ghouls out of the coach to collect our cases from the hold just in time to see a group of people, mostly robed, striding through the stage door of the Academy. From behind I couldn't be sure, but I suspected Papa had been among them. Without an invitation I was definitely sure I shouldn't follow them.

'Erm – excuse me?' I tapped the shoulder of the nearest ghoul, who recoiled from me with a hiss. The chrome facade didn't move. A mask, then. 'Sorry. I'm Charlie, I'm Papa's new … PA. D'you know what he might want me to do during the day?'

The ghoul tilted their head to the right as though observing a new specimen in a lab. The noise that came from behind the mask might also have been uttered to a new kind of insect.

'Don't even bother trying with them,' a voice from behind me almost made me jump: the guy driving the coach had approached us. 'You'll get nothing. I haven't mastered the language of Ghoul yet and I've been hanging around them years …' He shook his head, then rolled his eyes. 'Anyway. I'd imagine if he hasn't already asked you to join them in the venue, then you're free until the show. Does he have your number?'

'Erm, I think I put it on my contract when signed it, yeah.'

'I wouldn't worry, then. The hotel they're staying at's just round the corner, I can come and help you check in if you need to catch up on your sleep? I don't imagine you got much on the way up, did you?' The smile he gave me then was too knowing, and I returned it weakly.

'Yeah … yeah. That'd be great, actually.'

Still, there were definite nerves as I kicked off my boots and flopped backwards onto a clean, white bed. What if he did want Indian food or pie or coffee? I hadn't got on the wrong side of Papa as yet. What if he saw this as slacking off, on my very first day?

The nerves didn't last long. I was too fucking knackered for them.


	7. Leeds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As the title suggests, Ghost play Leeds, and Charlie finally gets to take Papa for a walk, where talk gets that bit heavier.

As soon as I woke up, I realised I'd done it of my own accord and not because someone had called or disturbed me – thank God. I checked my phone to see it was only early in the afternoon, so after a quick jaunt to the Morrisons in the Merrion Centre for supplies I snuggled myself back down on the bed, this time with my laptop and a fresh outfit. Papa knew I was still going to have to study. At least now I'd be able to just get up and go if he needed anything.

But it wasn't until the evening that I was called upon. And it wasn't via phone. Someone actually knocked on my door, making me start – had anyone ever knocked on my door when I'd been staying in a hotel before? Come to think of it, no. What good could come of something like that?

When I opened it up, it wasn't Papa, but an older man I hadn't seen before. Possibly he'd ridden up on the clergy coach. He had sunglasses even in Yorkshire March, a pencil moustache and absolutely no hair above his eyebrows.

'Good evening,' he said. 'We are preparing for the ritual and my brother wishes you to be there. Are you ready to go?'

He had an even stronger Italian accent than Papa. 'That all depends who your brother is, I suppose,' I said.

'Oh! Forgive me. I am Papa Emeritus the Second. I held my brother's position for the previous album and tour.'

I remembered what Laura had said about how they switched singers every couple of years or so, but now I had to navigate more than one of them at once, I had no idea how to address them to differentiate. 'I've just been calling your brother Papa,' I said nervously. 'Do I need to use your titles in full every time I address you? Have I been doing this wrong?'

He shook his head. 'It is usually obvious which one of us you mean. Sometimes we use Secundo and Terzo, though, if we really need to prevent confusion.'

'OK. Nice to meet you ... Secundo.'

He gave me a satisfied smile.

I was led to the Academy. We entered through the stage door and went directly to Papa's dressing room, where the man himself (or, I guess, the third man himself) was sitting in front of a mirror applying the finishing touches to his skull paint. I realised I'd grown so accustomed to seeing it that I couldn't imagine he had a real face underneath it.

'Ah! Good evening, brother,' he said brightly. 'Close the door … you have met my new assistant Charlie, I see.'

'Indeed,' said Papa. Two. The second. Secundo, whatever. 'For a change, I suspect you have made a good decision here. My brother could use somebody to deflate his head after rituals,' he added to me. I let out a tiny snort, wary of the effect it might have on my boss – but I could've sworn he allowed himself an even tinier smile.

'Not untrue. I trust you have scouted out the city?'

'Actually, I grew up not too far from here. I know exactly where we can escape to. I spent most of the day asleep, actually.'

'Hmm. Fair enough.' He nodded sagely at himself in the mirror before dabbing a tiny bit more black paint on his nose and nodding again. 'Perfect. Secundo. Would you mind leaving us so I can brief Charlie on the ritual? I'm sure Father will have some bullshit for you to be getting on with, no doubt.'

'He definitely will. I miss when it was not my job to be getting on with it …' He nodded to me, then left us to it.

Alone with Papa in his own dressing room. This was his turf now. Even if we were in my county.

'I am sorry we could not speak more today. There is so much to organise before every ritual, you see. And you understand why we cannot allow a newcomer. Much of it is confidential.'

He did sound apologetic. 'It's fine, honestly … I'm here for afterwards, not before,' I said. 'What you do apart from that doesn't concern me, does it?'

'It is nothing untoward, if that's what you are trying to say.'

A new, nasty warmth sprang to my cheeks. 'God, no – that's not – I just meant I don't mind not being part of the big picture, that's all –'

And I noticed that he was smiling. Properly now, none of that sly, sideways sort of smiling. He was enjoying how flustered I'd become.

'I was teasing,' he said. 'I know you understand. A lot of the afternoon is spent in meet and greets, and they are nothing if not wholesome. I still want you to experience the rituals, though.'

'I've seen one,' I reminded him.

'Ah, but have you seen one from the side of the stage, Charlie?'

*

Knowing what to expect made it even more intense. Even before the show started I was tingling all over to some ethereal hymn or other. I hadn't remembered it from the Forum – I probably hadn't been able to pay attention for customers. It almost brought tears to my eyes in the midst of all this, here in this blueish light on the first night of the strangest career move I'd ever made.

Papa in his full papal regalia was a sight to behold on entry, though he was also dashing in his 'casual' attire when he made the switch to that. He moved with more ease, too. While the ghouls may have been strange and unresponsive on the coach, they owned the stage as though they were designed to do so – but none of them as much as Papa. His every movement, word, careful movement of his eyes, was done to entrance someone or other. Sometimes one person in the crowd. I could see them when it happened to them: they always looked transfixed, like the masses of sweaty bodies around them had evaporated for that moment.

He was flirtatious, suggestive and sensual, even more so than I remembered, but he was never creepy. Nothing he did seemed inappropriate for the setting. In fact, it seemed like he was successfully seducing every single person in the room while making them feel like they were the only person in it. The line between the Papa I'd met at my merch table and the Papa I was now watching was blurred, I could see that much. But it was there. And this Papa … I could understand why Laura was so hot for him without even knowing much about him. I began to wonder whether there might be instances post-show where he would rather have me leave him alone with a groupie or two.

I could really have done with a cold shower before the encore. I vaguely remembered the last song from the last ritual. There was a slow refrain at the end, almost a chant, of coming 'together as one' which raised the atmosphere to religious heights. 'Ritual' indeed.

He gave me a sideways glance as he left the stage, flanked by ghouls. 'My dressing room,' he said. 'Five minutes?'

I met him there. He was in the same almost zen state he'd reached under the bridge at Wembley, only it suited the context more when he was sitting on a sort of small sofa thing in the privacy of a dressing room, leaning back against the wall. I noticed his corpse paint was intact. In fact, he hadn't even broken a sweat. I would've been pouring buckets under all of those stage lights, but he remained majestic as ever, even in his fatigue.

'I fainted last time I sang here,' he said, 'so you have no idea how pleased I am that I got through this entire show conscious. Did you enjoy it?'

I nodded before realising his eyes were still closed. 'Oh my God, yes,' I said.

'Did I not tell you,' said Papa, still with his eyes closed, 'that we are not a fan of that guy around here?'

That was, I think, the moment I started to truly understand what I had let myself in for.

He did meet some fans that night. I scouted the stage door out for him first, and on my OK, he came out to sign autographs – although I remained there, lurking, ready to swipe him away under the pretence of being another fan if one of the genuine ones got too much. None of them did, thank goodness. I wasn't entirely sure how I would deal with a rabid gig-goer trying to hog this intense man all to themselves.

The line between ritual-Papa and ordinary-Papa was becoming more defined. He dropped the flirtatious facade for the assembled fans, instead talking to them with a quiet sort of respect. My concern regarding groupies melted. That wasn't what he was here for. He stayed chatting and signing things until the very last person left, satisfied, and we were alone on the darkened pavement.

He heaved a contented sort of sigh.

'Are you ready for your first night at work?' he said to me.

'I've got just the place,' I said.

We ended up by the River Aire, near the financial district of the city and, most importantly, away from revellers. There was very little reason for anyone to be around here at this time of night. Aside from the odd convenience store, and a large flat development, the river was lined mostly with darkened commercial property that undoubtedly looked very impressive and important by day, when teeming with suits. Closer to the water, though, was the sort of grimness I loved about northern cities. A rough and ready towpath, if such things existed. I wouldn't have dared go down there alone after dark. I doubted anything would have happened to me but there was a certain something in the air that warned you, instinctively, to steer clear. With someone else, though, it felt like an adventure. If I'd been Laura I might have asked Papa to stop for a quick photoshoot for me – the monochrome of the night complemented his own look perfectly.

'How was your night, then?' I asked.

'Hmm. Good enough, I think,' he said. 'The ritual went well, but we could have done without Father's ridiculous drama beforehand.'

His tone was gruff, dismissive: maybe this wasn't something he was willing to talk too much about yet. 'Well, if you need me to keep him at bay, too …'

'There is no one in the world who could keep Papa Nihil from interfering if Papa Nihil wants to interfere. I wish Sister Imperator could have joined us on this leg to keep him in check. Let's just be thankful he's too old to stay awake so late.'

I nodded, concentrating on the path before us rather than looking at him. Somehow, Papa had managed to make his father sound horrifying and pathetic all at once. 'Your brother seemed nice, though,' I said. 'What's he like?'

There – that slight smile was back. 'He's fine, yes. I think he does resent me ever so slightly for taking over from him, but so far it's only ever been stupid brotherly resentment. More often than not he offers me the support a father ought to but doesn't. You would think he was more than just a few months older than me.'

I had to do a double-take then. The guy who'd knocked on my hotel door had seemed far older than the guy I was now walking alone by a dark river with: but whose age had I under- or over-estimated? It seemed rude to ask, somehow. Maybe it would come up later, when I knew him better. Or maybe I could interrogate a ghoul if I worked out how to get some sense out of any of them. 'It's cool that your whole family is part of Ghost, though. I moved about two hundred and fifty miles away from my parents for uni. I know I'm supposed to be an adult and independent and everything, but I do kind of miss them.'

'If you had to share tourbuses with them all the time you'd wish they were two hundred and fifty miles away,' Papa snorted. He nodded towards the city. 'Do your parents live locally?'

'Not locally enough to call on, if that's what you mean.'

'And do they know you've abandoned your studies to follow a Satanic rock band?'

It was my turn to snort. 'Are you really as evil as all that?'

'Hey. I said Satanic, I didn't say evil. Contrary to popular belief they are not the same thing.'

I'd grown up an atheist. I'd barely known any religious people at all in my life. I had no idea, therefore, how to engage in conversation with someone about a religion I knew nothing about whatsoever. I did, however, know a bit about music. 'Go on, then. When you go on tour, is it more about Satan or is it more about putting on a good show?'

'That,' Papa said, 'depends entirely on who you ask. But since you are asking me, I would say it is all about the show. You have two thousand plus people there for you who have all paid money to be there to watch you sing and play. You can't let them down. I would be furious if I paid to see a show that promised a spectacle but devolved into a sermon, wouldn't you?'

'It still feels religious, though. Being there watching, I mean. I don't know if that's how it feels for you, but for me … it did have that kind of atmosphere, I guess.'

'Tell my father that. He'd be pleased to think his baby son had done something right for a change.'

The way his voice hardened whenever he mentioned this enigmatic father had me on edge. 'I didn't mean to –'

'I know. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap. I suppose I am just a lot less bothered about the church than a lot of other people are, but it's ended up being my life's work somehow. Well, not somehow. Inheritance, of course. There's a reason I'm the third.'

'At least you enjoy the performance element. And you're so good at it.'

'I'm not paying you to be my fan.' Gruff amusement. I smiled down at my trainers.

'All right. I enjoyed all the other parts of it, too, not just you. What was that music that played before you came on-stage? The one with the really high choral singing in it?'

'Miserere Mei, Deus?'

'I'll take your word for it.'

'Father chose that, too.'

Quite the wrong thing to've said, then. I bit my bottom lip to stop myself blabbing anything else that might be accidentally contentious, though I couldn't help but know in that moment that if I ever heard the song again, maybe even in an actual church if I found myself in one for some event or other, that I'd be forever transported back to Leeds Academy. Or right here.

'Tell you what I could do for you. Right now,' I said brightly. 'We're not far from the train station and they've got a McDonald's.'

Despite his protests that Italy also had McDonald's, that was where we went. Is there anything better than a Maccy's after a gig, after all?


	8. Glasgow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The tour heads up to Glasgow, where Charlie thinks they'd better let their parents know where they've disappeared off to. Papa begins to relax into the new routine and Charlie suspects they're getting to know a more natural side of him.

Our next port of call was Glasgow, and a city I'd never been to before. After the nap that I feared was going to become standard, I spent a couple of hours of attempting to work before giving up. Life was getting a bit too wild and exciting to be able to concentrate on such stupid things as computer architecture and concurrency. I'd set myself a wordcount goal for the day of 500, and reached 176 before I ran out of steam. I closed the laptop, pulled on a jacket, and grabbed my phone.

Once again, Papa had disappeared straight into the venue with his entourage on clergy business. It was hard to imagine them all in the bowels of the ABC discussing matters like that, but I supposed it made sense when they were on the road. Maybe, if I stayed on tour with them until Milan, we'd be able to make a pit stop at their … hell, I didn't even know what you called their place of worship. What was a monastery? Was that it?

Today, though, I had a bit more focus. I needed to use my 'free' time to find the place Papa and I were going to escape to after the ritual, and in a city as big and unfamiliar as Glasgow, I had to allow myself plenty of time. And, since I'd be going it alone, I thought I might call home.

It hadn't occurred to me to tell my parents what I was doing. Or rather, I suppose it must have done on some level, but I'd ignored the thought as soon as it had surfaced because I knew exactly what their reactions were going to be.

'Now then!' Mum answered the house phone. 'This is a nice surprise … how are you doing, love?'

'I'm OK,' I said. 'Yeah. I mean, obviously I've got loads of coursework deadlines still, but …'

But what? That was not the reason I'd called. Of course it wasn't the reason I'd called. 'Mum, I'm actually in Glasgow.'

I could imagine her face on being told her child, studying in London, had decided to wander off to another country in the midst of the busiest part of the year, academically speaking. All tight frown and knotted-together eyebrows. 'What's in Glasgow that's so desperate? Are you still doing your uni work?'

'Yes – it's OK, don't worry. Everything's under control, I promise. I've just taken a temporary job with a band I met at work, that's all, so I'm on tour a bit at the moment. It won't be forever and I'm doing everything remotely anyway.' I said all of that as quickly as possible so that she wouldn't have the chance to question anything. That was my intention, at least. What actually happened was that none of it made much sense because all the words smushed into one another.

'Wait a moment. Have you left your old job?'

I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose with my free hand. 'No … no. I've just picked up some extra work with a band. I'm on tour with them. I actually thought a change of scenery might help make me more productive. I have my laptop with me and everything, I'm free pretty much all day so everything's still getting done.'

'Oh.' I could still visualise her frown. 'Is it t-shirt stuff? Like you do at the Forum?'

Even though I'd called home to give an update, it seemed far easier to just go along with the update Mum was starting to create for herself. 'Yes.'

I tried to kid myself into feeling better once I'd hung up the phone. Sure, if my family needed me in an emergency situation, at least they now knew where they might be able to find me. Plus there was the added reassurance that I had actually told them I wasn't where they assumed I always was. I had nothing to hide, after all. Why wouldn't I tell them that? But the fact that I couldn't even begin to explain what was really going on had surprised me a little bit. Laura knew everything, and we'd only known one another a year or so. Then again, she'd been there the night it had all started. She _got_ it. I'd have to give Mum a hell of a lot more context if she were to ever get her head around the insanity of my situation, and I couldn't bank on that. In fact, if I'd WhatsApped her a picture of Papa she'd probably have got straight in the car to come and pick me up.

That should've set alarm bells off. It didn't. It just gave me one of those rare, sometimes overwhelming but often fun moments when I remembered that I was truly an adult capable of making my own decisions. How old did you have to be before that knowledge became ingrained?

*

'I sense a theme here,' Papa said later.

We were meandering alongside the Clyde. I'd done my scouting earlier and found it to the south of the city, and we could follow it quite a way to the west and still have an interesting enough cityscape without any of the late night debauchery Glasgow was allegedly famous for. So far, though, I kind of loved the place. It reminded me of the northern cities I'd grown up frequenting. Raw and real.

'I'm … sorry?' I said. It was sometimes – wait, no. Almost always – difficult to work out what sort of tone he was trying to get across, especially when we first started talking. He'd been weirdly quiet on the way out of the city centre but I was getting used to that. I enjoyed the intensity, even. It didn't escape my notice that we got the strangest looks, and watching out for reactions was easier when I didn't have to concentrate on making conversation. 'I mean, if you fancy something in particular, I guess you just need to let me know. I just thought this stretch was pretty cool, that's all.'

'I am not complaining. Simply making the point,' Papa said, gesturing towards the water. 'It makes sense in cities. People are naturally drawn to water. It is our life source, after all.'

'Where's the next show?' I said.

'Manchester. We have a day off in between, though. Thank goodness. I think need to spend the whole day asleep and drinking green tea with honey …'

That mental image of Papa with a steaming mug of tea was too much, somehow. I had to suppress a snort before speaking again. 'So maybe I can find a park in Manchester. I know it better than Glasgow, anyway.'

We were approaching a huge complex with several huge, distinctive buildings that looked purpose-built for events. They were lit up in neon lights that changed colour rapidly, reflecting off the water of the river and creating the sense of being part of an even more vast landscape than we were already making our way through.

'If my father has his way I'm going to play there one of these days,' Papa said. He was nodding towards a huge, circular building that, I assumed, housed an arena. 'Probably quite soon if things keep going the way they are.'

Again with his bloody dad. I didn't focus on that. Instead I tried to picture the rituals, scaled up. It did seem to suit him.

'You say that with resentment but hell, I know you would _love_ to strut up and down a stage like that,' I said.

It was a risk, but it paid off.

'OK. You aren't wrong there,' he said. 'But my motivation is a lot more transparent. I love the theatre of the show. Father loves the idea that I could indoctrinate thousands more people to the church at a time. Our success is simply a means to his end, where for me, it is a thing in and of itself.'

'Because you love doing what you do?'

'Exactly. And that isn't enough for him.'

We were passing by the arena now, moving towards some kind of museum. Still the blocks of flats, streetlights and other giant buildings shimmered in the river, ethereal other-versions of themselves that looked almost as vivid.

'I think Iron Maiden were there earlier this year,' I said. 'You're supporting them soon. Next you'll be doing the same thing they are. They've been huge forever, haven't they?'

He could tell what I was hinting at, and he smirked down at the ground. I only dared to shake my head because I knew he wasn't paying enough attention to me to take exception. I couldn't help myself. He was trying to force his arrogance down but it was bubbling over even so, like the molten centre of an overfilled pie. Not that I wasn't enjoying it - but I was wondering if it might be a bit much considering what I knew about how Ghost operated.

'My friend Laura,' I said slowly. 'She knew more about you than I did, when we worked your ritual. She told me that Ghost changes their frontman every couple of years or so. How long have you been the singer for?'

He gave a sort of _hmph._ 'Nearly two years.'

My next question didn't come, but it was heavily implied by the weird new silence between us punctuated only by the breeze and the sound of a siren somewhere in the distance. Eventually, he gave a slow nod.

'Things are going … well, though. I do have some hope that I will be able to continue for a bit longer at least. We seem to have found our niche in music recently and maybe that's because of me.' He didn't sound as sure of himself as he normally did, I noticed. 'Maybe it isn't. Who knows. But I do wonder if my father is willing to work under that assumption and let me record on the next album.'

'I don't see why he wouldn't. Your shows are outstanding.' I felt myself flush. I was meant to be his PA, not his groupie. 'I can't see a reason to change anything, anyway.'

'Change is good,' Papa said in earnest. More earnest than I would've expected, actually, considering he was implying a pretty negative change where he was concerned. 'Change prevents stagnation. But I do hope to still be here for a little bit more time yet.'

'Well. For what it's worth, I hope you're still here for a little bit more time, too,' I said.

The silence, then, was different to the silences of finding a quiet spot. It seemed to consume more of me. Perhaps because we were getting further and further away from the city centre, or perhaps because there was a different sort of understanding in there. I wasn't sure and, to be honest, the idea of speculating made me a little bit nervous.

'Charlie?' Papa said. 'Do you have a smartphone with you?'

I pulled my phone out of my pocket. 'Why?'

He steered us to one side suddenly, and I couldn't work out why until he turned around and sank onto a bench I hadn't noticed. 'Come and sit with me for a while. I want to use your data, if you don't object?'

I was starting to wonder if there was anything this man could propose that I could object to. I sat beside him, half-expecting to surrender my phone and every bit of information on it, but he just directed me to YouTube and let me do the typing. _Papa Emeritus II live._

I didn't think I could imagine Ghost without him, but there they were. The bald guy from the hotel all robed and painted up commanded the stage in his unique fashion, but he stayed somehow on-brand even so. Darker, more mysterious. He didn't have a dapper outfit like his brother, and I couldn't help but wonder how he might have moved if he'd been wearing the suit I'd seen him in, but the intimidating intensity of his performance persona made that irrelevant.

Then we went further back, to smaller venues and grainier footage, to the first Papa. His face paint was cruder, his outfit too. Papa explained that they had been more underground back then, and he hadn't been as involved in the church as he was now. Somehow they were still recognisable as Ghost, yet so far removed. The same band pre-evolution. Even the ghouls were different with their basic face masks. It was genuinely fascinating to watch.

I don't know long we sat there. I started to feel the cold during the very first video we watched, but I stopped noticing it very quickly. Especially as he seemed to move ever so slightly closer to me in excitement every time he suggested a new video to watch. By the time he decided he wanted to call it a night, with an exaggerated yawn and stretch, his thigh was pushed right against mine.


	9. Student Services

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie experiences a dose of reality when they speak to Laura - and when their surreal new job role is interrupted by contact from uni.

It might have been super naïve of me. But knowing the band had a day off the next day made me wonder if I'd actually get to spend time with Papa in daylight.

Of course, I didn't.

We travelled to Manchester at a more leisurely pace, but I was still segregated from the important people of the clergy. I mean, in all fairness I would have had no idea what to say to Papa with the other high-up members of the church present considering our conversations always devolved to his resentment of his father. But once we got to Manchester, and once we got booked into our hotel, I'd thought I might see him checking in. I even thought, maybe, that once I'd set up my laptop to start work on my coursework, he might knock on my door.

Of course, he didn't.

And having free time, today, just meant more time to overthink. It was becoming routine to get into a new hotel room and open my laptop up almost as soon as I'd arrived, but I wasn't clicking with my writing at all this time. The words I'd already typed made about as much sense as Laura's coursework would've done to me.

The thought of Laura was comforting. She'd moved to London from Cheshire. That wasn't a million miles away from where I was sitting: I opened up Facebook and sent her a message, knowing that she, too, would probably be glued to a device of some sort and fuelled only by caffeine.

_Hey. I just got to Manchester – how are things with you?_

It took all of ten seconds for a response to come through.

_My brain's turned into a sort of gel. Are you free to talk?_

Technically … no? There was stuff to do and I knew it needed doing. But that was the exact reason I answered the phone when it rang, knowing full well we'd be chatting shit for hours.

'Mate!' Laura cried. 'I'm going to have to start demanding daily updates, I'm spending half my life wondering what's going on with you guys and the other half wondering what's going on with my coursework. Come on, fill me in!'

'I didn't message you to talk all about myself,' I said, though that was at least most of the reason. I had to pretend otherwise for a bit, though. It was only polite. 'Has anyone said owt about me … you know. Vanishing?'

It was a safe question. We didn't share coursemates or tutors, so it was unlikely Laura had come into contact with anyone who'd be worried about me. 'Everything's fine at my end, you know it is. Apart from coursework stress! I can't believe you're having to deal with that as well as dealing with _him._ And the rest! You don't want to hear my drama, there isn't any. You need to tell me what he's really like.'

'And what if he's listening?' I said with a smile. I was fairly sure the room wasn't bugged or anything, but a small part of me wouldn't have been surprised if Papa were keeping a closer eye on me than I thought. 'I mean – he's amazing. Obviously. In fact I can't think of a sexier, more intelligent or interesting human being. If he even is a human being. I've never seen him without his corpse paint so I'm beginning to wonder whether that's his actual skin …'

Laura's laughter was shrill and uncomfortable against my ear, but a joy to hear nevertheless. 'He's not listening! Don't be so stupid. Although you could be acting serious, I suppose, he _is_ devastatingly sexy.'

My instinct was to disagree with her. Just for the sake of disagreement, I suppose. I bit the retort back for a second, letting it fester on my tongue as I realised it was, simply, instinctive. Not necessarily a reflection on the real thoughts and feelings that were shifting ever so slightly in my mind.

'He's … something, isn't he?'

In her silence, I could see the dropped jaw and eyebrows that had vanished into her blunt, artsy fringe. 'That means you've done stuff with him! Doesn't it? Charlie?'

'No! No, it doesn't, I swear. I hardly see him except for when we're walking around at night. It's just …' What _was_ it 'just'? Why had this desire to express something new only surfaced now I had Laura to express it to? 'Nothing's happened. Last night we walked alongside the river in Glasgow for a bit, that's all. And then we got onto talking about his family. Like, the other frontmen, and his dad, too. And he ended up sitting us down so he could show me old videos on my phone of them, when they were the singers of Ghost. It just felt like a shift, you know? In the dynamic between the two of us. One minute we're marching quietly around Glasgow after dark because he pays me to take him away from the hustle and bustle, the next he's a constant stream of chatter as he talks me through all these videos, and I'm sitting right up against him feeling like he maybe trusts me on some new level because why else would he be so open?'

'Because he trusts you on some new level. You're exactly right. D'you remember the first time we met at the start of uni? Within half an hour I'd told you all about how I'd almost had sex with my old graphics teacher in the function room of my local because you seemed like the sort of person it was OK to tell stuff like that to. And you _are_. Why d'you think he hired you for this?'

That question, whether consciously or unconsciously, was never not playing on my mind. Fortunately, Laura understood how difficult I found it to answer.

'You need to believe that you're great, Charlie. Some people are just people people, and that's what you are. Even though you spend half your life buried in code or whatever.'

'There's more to computer science than code,' I protested without much effort. It was just a deflection from what she was trying to say, and what I was finding hard to believe.

'I know, I just enjoy winding you up about it. You're the best and only computer scientist I know, OK? But you're also one of the best people I know. And I wonder whether maybe your future lies in people and not computers.'

There it was again. That weird, stupid ache for a job where I got to hang around some music venue or other, doing something music-related or other, with some people or other. The full-time version of Laura and I selling shirts. Or this. Exactly what I was doing right here.

But she'd reminded me that I was indeed meant to be a computer scientist, and there were still quite a few thousand words of coursework that needed writing. Ironically, the distraction became the reason I said goodbye and turned back to what I ought to've been doing – but not before I got a recommendation for where I could take Papa that night. And no, it wasn't the Manchester Ship Canal.

My coursework didn't make any more sense after a break. I was used to weird sleeping patterns, of course, but I supposed I wasn't used to this specific lifestyle of constant late nights and bad quality rest, dashing around the country and never knowing exactly where you were going to wake up. Normally, holing myself up in the library with the judgement of strangers to spur me on got my brain past first gear pretty quickly. Now, with very little else to do in this hotel room alone, my grey matter couldn't get out of reverse. There was no way I could have written real words in that moment. Everything I did would have had to've been re-done at a later date – a later date that, infuriatingly, I didn't have.

Hm. I knew I'd sent myself a couple of journal articles on my uni email. Maybe, if nothing else, I could read those and make notes on anything useful. I opened Outlook, skimming over the usual student event spam until a more official-looking subject line caught my attention.

_Missed lectures_

It was from a pretty senior tutor on my course who only had me for one seminar a fortnight. This couldn't have been good. There was a nasty sort of pressure in my chest as I opened the email.

_Dear Charlie,_

_It has come to our attention that you have missed several lectures over the past few days with no reason or apology given._

_If you have a medical reason for missing lectures you must contact your course tutors, who will send you any work you have missed. If the problem is ongoing, you must bring a fit note, signed by your doctor, to my office._

_If there is another reason preventing you from attending the course then please get in touch with me so we can make arrangements for you to catch up on anything missed._

_I'd like to take this opportunity to remind you that all lectures and seminars on this course are compulsory, and failure to attend without a reason provided will result in escalation to stage two of our nonattendance process._

Fuck. Honestly, there were hardly any lectures on any more – we were all tearing our hair out over project and coursework deadlines. Even the ones that were on historically housed a handful of their normal turnout because most students are, let's face it, pretty shit at managing their workload. We love the adrenaline rush of a race to the finish line, seeing how tightly we can squeeze that Turnitin submission to the 11.59pm deadline … _fuck._

Was I supposed to reply? Explain myself somehow? Or would uni simply expect me to turn up for my next lecture, whenever that was? Time's not really real when life becomes all about doing the same thing repeatedly. I had to remind myself that I'd only done this three times so far. Already it was just 'the way things were'.

That couldn't have been a healthy attitude.

All right. My fingertips hovered above the keys of my laptop and I sighed at the screen.

I'd been ill. Yes. That was it – I'd been so ill that I'd been unable to leave the flat. I probably wasn't going to be better until after the Easter holidays. I mean, I was better enough that I could maybe bring myself to submit my assignments, but I was too ill to physically get into uni. Could they ask for a fit note if I was still doing my work? Either way, it was a better response than the truth.

I tapped it out. One of those overly formal replies that you'd never say aloud. As a result, I was still re-reading it, making sure it didn't sound pretentious and shit, when my phone started to ring.

I was so involved in my uni predicament that I immediately assumed it'd be them calling me to check up on me – I side-eyed the screen to see a name attached to the number, though. Papa III.

I almost dropped the phone as I grappled for it in my rush to answer in time. 'Hey …. hey. Sorry. I'm just in my hotel, is everything all right?'

The little noise he made in this throat then suggested everything was anything but all right. 'Hello Charlie,' he said. 'I hope I haven't disturbed you. Nothing's wrong but I would like you to meet me at the venue if that's possible.'

'Of course it is, it's what I'm here for,' I said, glad of an excuse to shut my laptop guilt-free. 'Should I come straight away?'

'No. I mean … don't rush. It's quarter to now, I will tell security to expect you at around half past. Ask for my dressing room, they will show you where to go.'

If he needed me, I needed to rush. Naturally.


	10. Here's Papa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie meets Papa Nihil, and sees Papa in all his majesty as he prepares for the Glasgow ritual.

The hotel wasn't far away from the Apollo: I spent a few moments making sure I didn't look like hell, in case this was the outfit I was going to have to wear for the ritual and afterwards, before leaving. There was indeed someone waiting at the stage door for me, and when I gave the guy my name, he took me directly to a door labelled 'Papa Emeritus III'. It no longer surprised me that he had his own room fully labelled up in a venue he was only spending one night in.

'He's told me you can go right in,' the security guard said, and he even opened the door for me.

Papa wasn't alone. In the room with him was a man who had to be his father. If not, he had to've been the oldest, most intense Ghost fan I'd met so far. He was dressed in full papal robes, way fancier than anything I'd seen on an actual pope, and he, too, had his face fully painted, although his look was softer, somehow. Less angular for a less angular, more worn face, I assumed. As I looked, I noticed his eyes were both clouded over, fully white.

Neither of them registered me, though.

'… think that it would be prudent to allow you to carry on without supervision,' the man I assumed was Papa Nihil was saying.

'I am supervised. You have half of the order on tour with us, it's not as though I can defy you.'

'You don't have the order when you go gallivanting after rituals with that –'

Guessing he was going to start on about me, I cleared my throat.

'Hello,' I said. 'We haven't met. I'm Charlie, Papa's PA. And I wouldn't call it _gallivanting,_ per se, it's more just a gentle meander most of the time. How are you?'

My audacity surprised me. I don't know if you've ever been stared down by two men in robes and skull paint, but it's an intense sensation. Especially when you've just walked in on them discussing you.

'Ah! Charlie,' Papa Nihil said, and his voice lost its harshness in place of a sudden enthusiasm. 'I was hoping to meet you tonight. Actually, I am not well at all. That is the entire point of my being here. But thank you for asking.'

My sideways glance at Papa – Terzo? To make my life easier for the time being, at least – wasn't conscious, but his tiny nod was. It was his blessing to go ahead and talk, I guessed. 'I'm sorry to hear that. What's happened?'

'Nothing unusual,' Papa Nihil said. His accent, like his sons', was heavy. 'I have not been in the best of health for many years, and now and again my lungs decide to make life particularly difficult. I was just explaining to _mio figlio_ that I may need to travel back to the ministry in order to rest for the US leg of the tour. That is the big one, as they say, and I'd rather like to be there for as long as I possibly can. Unfortunately, this _stronzetto_ is not to be trusted without someone keeping a close eye on him.'

'Yes, yes, OK. And that is why I have asked Charlie to come here, to prove to you that someone very sensible and down to Earth is keeping a close eye on me after rituals,' Terzo said impatiently. 'Papa, if you need to rest, you need to rest. Go back to Italy. Sister Imperator will look after you. I will be _fine._ '

'It's not you being fine I'm worried about,' Nihil muttered, 'it's the reputation of the ministry.'

But he left it at that. His robe swept ominously like a Hogwarts professor or something as he strode off. He even walked like someone in charge. I looked over at Papa, who now seemed oddly shorter and quite a lot less imposing than usual.

'That's my dad,' he said.

'I guessed.'

'Hm.'

'I'm guessing Sister Imperator is a nun?'

He nodded tersely. 'As much as my father likes to think he's in charge of the ministry, we all know it is her.'

I tried to smile at him. 'What did he mean about the “reputation of the ministry”, anyway? Have you been bringing Ghost into disrepute? Orgies in the car park and all that sort of thing?'

His face tensed up, like he was resisting laughter. Which he was, because he gave up after about two seconds to snort. 'You're joking but you are not far off. I went off the rails somewhat when I was first appointed. You have no idea what getting this,' he gestured at his face paint, 'does to you when you've been waiting so long for it. The sense of power is overwhelming.'

My stomach stirred. Fluttered. Mental images were surfacing that definitely shouldn't have been, and judging by the smirk on Papa's face, he had an idea that they were there. 'Well … why not? You're a grown man, right?'

'A grown man with papal responsibilities, that's the problem,' Papa said. 'You've probably guessed that I have calmed down since then. But my father has never forgotten the party days, even though my brother had the same reaction to being made Papa. I suspect it is something to do with the differences in how we handle the stage.'

'The way you make the entire audience feel like you're making love to them, you mean?' I said.

'Making love?' Papa raised his eyebrows. 'Not fucking?'

I hoped to God – or to Satan? - that he didn't notice me blanch at the word. 'No! Come on. You know exactly what you're doing and it's way, way more than – fucking. Like when you choose someone to sing to during Cirice, it's so … intense. It's done out of passion, isn't it? Passion for making your _audience_ feel good. Not yourself. So it's not fucking.'

He'd watched me garble my way through my explanation with a thoughtful frown, but when he was sure I'd finished talking, it twitched upwards. He nodded slowly at me.

'That's what your dad doesn't like?' I ventured, and his nodding grew more enthusiastic.

'Precisely. I'm not there to make them feel good, I'm supposed to be making them feel like life is worthless so we can convince them they need _us_ to have any sort of purpose. That's how the church has traditionally worked.'

'But your way's better,' I said. ' _I know your soul is not tainted …_ '

'I thought I told you I didn't employ you to be my fan.'

'Yeah, you did,' I said. 'But somewhere along the way, I think I became one anyway.'

The gaze we shared then was new. Even under the paint I could see a softness to his expression, something I was more likely to see on Laura than on him. There was familiarity and comfort there, more so than there ever had been between us before.

'I'd better –' He gestured towards the door.

'OK. I'll meet you after the show. Break a leg.'

'Don't say that. I actually fall over quite a lot. I'm terrified I will break my leg one of these days.'

I tried to picture the elegant man in front of me, bedecked in his robes and mitre, hitting the deck. I had to admit, I struggled. He watched me watching him for a moment before giving me a small, 'are you with us?' wave. I blinked – by the time I was mentally back in the room, he was already on his way out of it.

'You look amazing, by the way,' I said stiffly. Because I needed to say _something_ before we went on stage. And because he really, really did.

That did it. He turned his head so that he was observing me over his shoulder and I suddenly wished I'd said nothing. I hadn't anticipated having to look him in the eye after words like that. His eyes, in fact, were looking at all of me. I watched them travel from my trainers back up to my face, and wished I'd put on something a bit smarter.

'As do you,' he said. ' _Arrivederci_ , Charlie.'


	11. Madchester

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie takes a break from waterways and takes Papa to a bit of green space, where his more playful side begins to show.

I really, really liked it when he spoke Italian.

I think, looking back, that that was the first time I started to acknowledge it to myself. There was indeed something about him that had me intrigued. No, more than that: the intrigue had come initially but now I was starting to understand him that bit better, it was leading me somewhere else. He wasn't untouchable any more.

For the first time, I watched the show from the crowd. I slipped out of the wings during Miserere Mei, Deus so I could stand to the side of the masses, giving myself a bit more room and staying out of Papa's eyeline. I didn't want him to know what I was doing, although I wouldn't have been able to begin to explain to myself why. Perhaps I wanted the true fan experience. To forget what he was like as a person and watch him as a performer now that I actually understood Ghost and what they were trying to do. No lurking behind merch, no whispering to Laura. I was starting to retain the songs in my mind and I was starting to love some of them.

It also gave me a chance to feed off the people here who were true fans. To feel the tangible anticipation all around me as the lights went down and the eerie, backwards intro music started to play before the band launched into Square Hammer. To see people raising their arms and singing all of the words, bouncing and shouting to the anthemic choruses and becoming more subdued and emotional to intense, slower numbers.

And the girl who got to hold his hand during Cirice? That night was the first night I felt a pang of something not unlike jealousy.

He didn't need saving from the autograph hunters afterwards, so I simply stood at a safe distance, keeping one eye on things. There was no need for my intervention, no disrespect. It took a while for everyone to dissipate but they did, in the end, and he was left alone right at the door of the Apollo as I looked on from the rear end of the tour bus. He seemed to have forgotten where he'd left me. For a moment I just watched him peer around, his forehead wrinkled, until we locked eyes.

He rarely bothered getting changed. I learned he was mostly interested in distancing his real self from his stage self, not his any self from other people, so if there was very little risk of being mobbed by random fans he liked to get straight on with our mini adventures. Tonight, I'd forsaken the now-predictable walk by a river. We had to get on a night bus, something that felt completely insane to me when he was still in his casual stage garb, but something that seemed to amuse him.

'There are a couple of places quite central but I thought we might do well to move into the suburbs a bit,' I told him. We'd sat ourselves on the top deck, right at the front, so the only people who had a good view of his paint were our reflections. I didn't tell him I used to pretend to drive buses this way when I was a kid, or that I was thinking about that now. The city swooping by underneath me made me feel removed from the real world somehow, even more so than I usually did when I had him near.

'I am happy to wait as long as it takes,' he said vaguely. He, too, was gazing out of the window at the lights and buildings as they blurred by, streetlights following a rhythm of sorts. 'I trust you.'

That was good enough for me. I didn't feel the need to think of stuff to say any more. I just leant back in my seat and, instead of watching the world go by, I watched him watching the world go by. Somehow, Manc suburbs were a lot more fascinating when you were taking a beautiful tourist through them. By bus, no less.

Platt Fields Park was, apparently, where Laura did Parkrun when she was at home. It wasn't somewhere I'd been before but the way she'd described it, I knew I had to take Papa there. She'd also been over the moon at the idea that he would be somewhere she knew well, and the next time she ran there, she assured me, she'd be daydreaming of him waiting for her at the finish line. She went into quite a lot more detail about what she'd be daydreaming happened afterwards, too.

By night, there were no runners. I guessed we should probably stay away from the darker, more shadowy parts, but there was no shortage of other places to explore. The big kid in me who'd been pretending to drive the bus threatened to burst out and run off towards the playground or the BMX track, but I managed to rein it in, following Papa's lead. He was wandering, as usual. Still another place by the looks of it. His head was tilted upwards, one eye on the path in front of him but one eye on the city skyline.

'You OK?' I ventured quietly, and he nodded.

'I am absolutely fine. Thank you for asking. How are you tonight?'

It was easier, somehow, to admit to what I'd done when he wasn't looking at me. 'I'm … really good. I actually sneaked into the crowd to watch the ritual and it sort of blew me away on a level I've never experienced before.'

He literally stopped in his tracks. Hands folded behind his back, he turned on his heels to face me with his eyebrows closer to his hairline than to his actual eyes.

'You'll be at the stage door after the next ritual, the way you are going,' he said.

'Stop it,' I said, as he started walking again: I had to skip for a couple of steps so I could catch up to him. 'I'm not licking your arse. I'm just saying I genuinely enjoyed my night, that's all. It was the first time I've watched you from a crowd's point of view and … well. I don't know what Nihil's problem is. You do a sterling job.'

'You _are_ licking my … arse?' He said it in my accent, and I snorted. 'I told you what his problem is. Thank goodness he is probably on a plane to Italy as we speak. If I'm lucky he will stay sick until the end of the tour, but knowing the tenacity of the old bastard he will be in America before I am.'

My contract, as far as I could remember, only covered the rest of the European leg of the tour – we hadn't discussed what was going to happen beyond that. The email from uni resurfaced in my mind, prompting anxious bile in my throat which I swallowed quickly.

'I got an email from uni today,' I said. 'They think I'm ill. I told them I haven't been able to leave my flat.'

I could tell it jarred him. Perhaps, like me, he'd forgotten he'd wrenched me from some ordinary life.

'What did they say?'

'I haven't had a chance to check for a response. I'm assuming they won't march to my flat and check, though,' I said.

'Well … good. I don't know anything about your studies but I know that you definitely belong with me – us. For the time being, at least.' He gestured around us in a giant circle. 'We still have the whole of Europe, Charlie. Have you been to mainland Europe before?'

'To France. And Spain, once.'

'Then you can't stay in London. As long as you are maintaining the same effort in your studies I see no reason why we cannot extend your contract. Let me know what your university say. I can forge a note from your doctor if you need me to.'

'I couldn't ask you to do that –'

'You didn't ask me to do that. I will do it anyway.'

'I could get into serious trouble. They could throw me off my course, Papa.' It was my turn to stop now. He didn't realise for a moment, striding ahead with purpose for several more paces before he glanced over his shoulder to see me, feet firmly planted on the ground with my arms folded against my chest. I was feeling weirdly defensive all of a sudden, and my voice hardened. 'You know I want to fulfil my contract. I wish I could do this as a real job. But you are _not_ endangering my education. You knew I was a student when you took me on, that's … that's got to come first.'

I'd been harsh, I had to admit. But no less harsh than I imagined he was capable of if he really needed to be. He still looked rather defeated, though, and the walls I'd built in my own defence crumbled. I released my arms, letting them hang.

'Sorry,' I said. 'I just –'

'No,' he said. 'No need to apologise. You are right. Of course.'

'Well, maybe. But I wish I wasn't.'

It made me wonder, in the moment, why on Earth I'd applied to a computer science course in the first place when all it seemed to be taking was some flamboyant Italian anti-pope sweeping me away to make me want to sack it off completely.

We started walking again by mutual, if silent, consent. I couldn't really work out if he was mad, upset, or just nervous about riling me up again. I couldn't really work out if I was any of those things, either. I lagged behind him by a couple of steps this time, so he'd see me in his periphery but I couldn't see his face. We neared the kids' park and he made a sudden turn to take us right into it – whatever I thought he was thinking about, this wasn't it.

'Are you five?' I said, but he waved my concern away.

'There are no actual children here, don't worry. I have an idea.'

Why did that fill me with trepidation?

He trusted me: maybe I trusted him. All he did, as I watched from a safe distance, was climb onto a climbing frame, bending double to duck under an archway atop a small ladder. Because it was designed for proper little kids, it didn't actually elevate him all that high, which was a relief. He was maybe now about two feet taller than I was, and he beckoned me over with impatience, as though it should have been obvious that I was meant to follow him.

'No – stay there,' he said frantically, when I made for the mini ladder he'd climbed up. He was pointing at the rubbery ground right in front of him. 'Here, I mean.'

'What are you playing at?' I said, but he wouldn't say anything until I obliged. I gazed up at him, the white of his face paint stark against the sky above him. It wasn't quite stage lighting, but there was real drama there still if you ignored the children's play equipment surrounding us.

'Imagine this,' he said, patting the metal fence of the climbing frame that was clearly designed to stop small children plummeting to the ground, 'is the barrier of the Apollo. And imagine you are in that crowd again. I know, it is not ideal exactly, but …'

And he knelt down and reached for my hand through the 'barrier'.

Even without the venue, the ghouls, the music and the crowd, it was quite something to have Papa Emeritus the Third sing to you while maintaining an incredibly intense eye contact while your hand was in his. I knew exactly what he was doing, and why he was doing it now. The soft _can't you see that you're lost without me?_ was the clearest possible indicator that he wanted me to make a choice somewhere along the line. That university could do one. That computer science was never going to result in peaceful, yet electric, nights like this. And the infuriating, but glorious, thing was that it worked.

He raised my hand to kiss it, and the warmth of his lips lingered there for a very long time after he'd let me go.

'If you had come to the front tonight I would of course have chosen you,' he said quietly.

What do you even say to that? I was sure he'd meant nothing in particular by it. But my chest was tightening as I looked up at him.

'I get to hang out with you all the time, I don't begrudge whoever it was their ciricing,' I said. 'They're probably lying in bed right now reliving it – it's a shame you can't see how magical it is.'

'Oh, I can imagine. A specimen like this?' He gestured at his body with a flourish. 'I'd have an erection.'

The moment, whatever moment it was, had dissolved. We were both in fits of uncontrollable laughter within seconds, and when he tried to vault the fence to hop back onto the ground, he totally misjudged the placement of his hand on the rail: his glove slid and so did he, landing with a surprising _thud_ for someone so lithe.

I took a courteous second to make sure he wasn't seriously injured before bursting into fresh peals of laughter. A string of angry Italian, presumably swearwords, rushed forth from him, and I sat beside him as he straightened up. He was rubbing his right shin where he'd landed, but the fact that he could touch it without screaming was probably not a bad sign.

'Shit, I wish I'd been filming that,' I said. 'Maybe that's your falling over quota for the European tour met now?'

'I hope to Satan it is, I'm in agony,' he gasped – but I knew him well enough now to know when he was being extra. I started humming a line from one of his songs about falling down, and he gave me a playful, if slightly savage, nudge to the ribs.

'Sorry … sorry.' I huffed. 'Let's have a look at that leg.'

There was a flutter, I must admit, when I rolled up his trouser leg to inspect the damage. He was sitting fully upright now, leaning on his palms and watching me examining him. That he trusted me to handle him at his most fragile … I glanced up to check his reaction to being touched. No wincing. Good. Just a very serious, very focused gaze, his attention on my hands. His hair, normally slicked back for rituals, had been tousled by the fall, now sweeping down over his face so that only his green eye was visible. He hadn't noticed me watching him. That, I think, was a factor in how long I spent doing it.

'You're OK,' I said. 'I'm no doctor but I think we'd know if you'd broken anything.'

'Yes,' he said. 'But you already knew that, didn't you?'

 _You just wanted an excuse to touch me_ was the sentence he left unsaid.

'Where did you land? On your knee?' I ignored what he'd said, moving my hand slightly further up his leg and coming into contact with something very solid that was not a kneecap. 'Argh! What's that?' He gave me a little nod, permission to roll the trouser leg up even further – I did this, revealing a knee pad. 'What the – is this how prepared you are for falling over?'

'I am prepared for everything,' he said. 'But I think we should maybe call it a night, huh?'

I wanted to scream _no,_ to circle this park with him until the sun came up. But all that meant was that I should probably spend the night alone in my room, stewing over why I might've wanted to circle the park with him until the sun came up.

I had to pull him to his feet. He absolutely insisted he couldn't put weight on his leg, so I had to walk with my arm around his waist, acting as a crutch all the way back to the bus stop. But when we got off the bus, and made for the hotel, he was walking just fine.


	12. Birmingham Bertie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Proceedings are interrupted by a phone call from uni, and Charlie has to face Papa with the unfortunate fact that they still have a degree to study for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not as good at updating this - and other work - as I'd like to be right now. For better or for worse, my life has returned to a sort of 'normality' following six plus months of COVID-related chaos. I miss a lot of stuff about lockdown. Mostly free time that I used to write all this stuff.
> 
> Also - chapter title robbed off Blackadder Goes Forth - has nothing to do with the chapter except for its location. I'm fucking tired.

_Charlie. I have a horrible feeling one of your tutors is going to email you quite soon. I might have dropped the ball a bit, I'll explain later if you get a chance to call me. Hope you and PEIII are OK xxxxxxxxx_

That was quite a lot more kisses than Laura usually put on messages. I looked away from my phone, out at the now-familiar rush of streetlights flashing past the coach. They were more defined in early daylight, nevertheless blurring into the pinkish-blue of the sky.

She was buttering me up, for real. I couldn't work out how, though. We were each other's best friends and we didn't have much else in common in uni terms, so I couldn't think how any of my tutors could have got in touch with her in an official capacity. Unless Charlie had been on a night out with a tutor by accident and ended up blabbing about me?

_Can you please explain what the hell you're on about? I won't be mad but what you sent makes no sense without context, my friend xxx_

It was still ridiculously early, but I doubted we were far from Birmingham by now. The ghouls around me were snoozing, their snuffling, dog-like snores indicating they weren't about to wake up any time soon. A burning desire to talk to somebody surfaced, no doubt because I knew that wasn't possible on that coach right then.

I tried to open my emails, but I was interrupted by a phone call from an unknown number. Thank God my phone was on silent. I stared at it, willing myself to recognise the string of digits, but I was pretty sure I'd never seen them before.

I was also pretty sure what they might have been related to, though.

With a huge sigh, I answered the phone.

'Hello, Charlie?'

Fuck fuck fuck. I'd heard that voice many times before.

'Hello, Dan,' I said slowly, burying my face in my free hand. Dan was my personal tutor: he led the systems engineering modules, something that never had been and never would be my forte, but his general loveliness more than made up for that. I'd semi-considered a final project in his specialities just so he could be my supervisor in third year because I knew he would be the most supportive supervisor of all time. So I knew that whatever conversation was about to transpire was going to turn me to mush.

'Charlie! Thank goodness. It feels like a very long time since I've heard from you. I'm just checking in – is everything all right?'

Another huge sigh, this time with my phone held away from my face. 'I'm fine,' I said. 'I mean – no, I'm not fine. But I will be. I'm so sorry. I emailed the department yesterday explaining everything …'

'Oh. Well – that was actually why I was calling you,' Dan said. 'Because I knew you'd been sent an email a couple of days ago but you'd never replied. We even looked up your address so we could check in with your flatmate and you weren't there …'

 _Oh, fuck._ My response now depended entirely on what Laura had told them, and of course, I had no idea what she'd told them. 'I've been really ill,' I said. I tried to make my voice huskier, as though that were a symptom of every possible illness. 'I thought I'd emailed explaining this, I'm sorry. I don't think I'll be making it back to uni for a while.'

Dan didn't bother concealing his sigh. 'Your flatmate said you'd gone home to deal with a family emergency?'

If this had come to me via email, I'd've been able to rationalise some proper response. Maybe that my illness was sensitive so I'd lied to Laura, or Laura had lied to them. Or maybe that the emergency was sensitive so I'd lied to Laura, or Laura had lied to them. There were probably numerous ways out of this if I'd had chance to think about them.

But I didn't have that chance. There, on that bus, I felt as though I might hurl my hurried breakfast pastries all over the back of the seat in front of me.

'Charlie, I can't help you if you can't be honest with me. I really want to see you back at uni, you have deadlines soon and I'm worried you won't make them. There are extensions available for exceptional circumstances, you know that. If you need them, you only have to talk to me …'

'I … I don't need them,' I said quickly, while cursing myself for not admitting that maybe I could've had them anyway since they were being offered on a plate. 'I'm sorry. I really am. I just sort of had to disappear. Things aren't going amazingly for me at the moment.' _Stay vague. You can explain later, when you've had time to get your story – any story – straight._

'I'd like to meet up with you, if possible. You're not in trouble. I just want to help you. Can you come in and see me next week?'

Poor Dan. Poor, lovely Dan. I knew I would never be able to deny him.

I told him I'd come to his office on Tuesday.

*

Papa must've clocked the look on my face after the ritual. I'd barely been able to pay attention to it, such a horrible contrast from the complete, blissful immersion of the previous night. And when he left the stage, and met my eyes briefly in what was usually a sort of 'OK?', his eyes narrowed.

'I'm not meeting fans tonight,' he said.

'Oh, you are,' I told him firmly. 'I'll catch up with you whenever you're done with that.'

'No. We're going right now. Come on, before they get to the stage door. I will have Omega apologise.'

I had no idea who Omega was, but I let Papa steer me out of the Academy even so. The irony wasn't lost on me. Our first meeting, and all the effort we'd gone to to make sure Papa drew as little attention as possible as we hurried across Kentish Town, seemed irrelevant now.

I'd spent most of the day struggling with my essays. My laptop had been asleep, and when I'd opened it up the screen with my unsent email had loaded up. I'd screwed myself over – I was sure I'd replied. But it was what it was. Now that uni felt like a concrete thing again and not just some vague concept that might or might not have existed in some previous life I'd been injected with a tiny bit more motivation, but still nowhere near enough. Once I'd ran out I'd looked up a lovely-looking botanical garden for us to go to, but he wasn't taking us that way. In fact, if I remembered rightly, he was taking us back to the hotel. Back to his _room,_ no less.

In any other situation, there may have been alarm bells sounding in my head. But I'd come to trust him implicitly, and when he sat down on the bed, I followed suit.

'Something's wrong,' he said. 'Come on. Tell your Papa.'

He was trying to be funny, to put me at ease, but the concern was still in his eyes and it made it very easy to blurt the problem straight out.

'I need to go back to university,' I said.

He folded his arms. 'All right. When do you need to be there?'

'Tuesday.'

His arms tightened against his chest. 'And when you go … you'll stay?'

I'd never seen him look so small. He was hunched in on himself, head bowed so that he had to look up at me. And it pained me to nod.

'I'll get in trouble otherwise,' I said. 'They can kick me off the course for nonattendance and they know … well. Laura and I should've communicated better. They know I'm not ill or anything, so I spoke to my tutor and …'

'And you're going to go back and study. It's fine. You don't have to explain yourself.'

His sentences were short, sharp and clipped, and he was still sitting all scrunched up – which just made me all the more determined to explain myself.

'I'm sorry,' I said, in a bit of a rush. 'I got an email and I thought I'd replied to it and covered my tracks but the email never sent and …'

'It's fine. I said. I'm sure you'd rather stay with us but I'll make sure you get back to London on Monday.'

Why was he speaking like he was trying not to be cross with me? If I pushed him, was he going to yell? This weird, forced calm was somehow even more horrifying. I couldn't read him, and I'd got rather used to being able to guess what might be going on in his brilliant mind.

'You don't understand what it's like for me!' I cried suddenly. There was a burning in the back of my throat now and it was hard work trying to sound confident through it. 'I'm just a normal person, Papa! You came and scooped me out of a normal person's life and let's face it, it was stupid to think that this could last! Your world is beyond me and no doubt mine is beyond you, too. I really, really am sorry. But I need to go back.'

I was on my feet – when that had happened, I had no idea. He was even smaller now I towered over him, reminiscent of how it might have felt to be him when he was onstage gazing down at the object of his next ciricing. Unlike the recipient, though, he did not look like his year had just been made. He was still withdrawn, still scrunched up, and now his face was so set I wondered if he'd ever speak again.

He did, though. 'I … I think I need to go to bed.'

There were tears on my face. I tried to wipe them away surreptitiously, knowing full well he would already have seen them. 'Fine. I'll go back to my room.'

No botanical garden, then. Nothing of the sort.

I was crying before I even reached my own room. Thankfully, there was no one on the corridor to see my tears, but my strangled sobs must have penetrated the walls and disturbed at least some of the other guests. I wasn't even sure I could pinpoint the reasoning behind them. They felt like a culmination of emotion, not just a reaction to a specific event. By the time I got back to my own room, locking the door behind me, I could barely breathe. I jumped onto the bed, face-first, and pushed my head into my pillow to stifle the sound.

I didn't want to go. That much was clear enough. But did he even care? The robotic reaction to my revelation had thrown me completely, when the other day he'd been threatening to impersonate a medical professional on my behalf in order to keep me as part of the clergy. What had changed? The horrible idea that it might have been something I'd done had me nauseous, but I couldn't for the life of me think of what that might have been.

Unless he'd expected me to be fully dedicated. Once we'd discussed Europe, perhaps he'd taken it for granted that I would abandon any previous plans I may have had in order to follow him to the USA. If I didn't have my own life, the opportunities abounded. In a fantasy world, following Papa around the globe was a dazzling prospect.

But I did have my own life. I'd just semi-forgotten about it, until uni had been in touch and brought me crashing down from this dream-reality I'd lost myself in. And maybe facing up to that was the reason I couldn't seem to stop sobbing. A life where I stressed over deadlines and doubted my own capabilities in the speciality I was supposed to have knowingly chosen for myself. None of that felt as natural – as _me –_ as what I'd found myself doing completely by accident. Even though the person who'd convinced me to do it now couldn't care less.

I hadn't stifled quite hard enough. Once I'd finally begun to calm down, there was an urgent rapping on my door. With a groan, I grabbed a spare pillow and pushed it into the back of my head in the vain hope that my visitor would get bored and leave me in my misery.

'Charlie? It's Papa – Secundo. I need you to let me in, please.'

I groaned again. This had to be official, and I doubted any of the Papas were the type to leave well enough alone just because somebody wanted them to.

'Fine. Give me a moment.'

I made a detour to the door via the bathroom so I could scrub at my face. My eyes were still blotchy but I managed to freshen myself up just enough that maybe I could pass as simply tired under yellowish hotel lights. Not that it mattered. I suspected that the clergy talked to one another, and he might have some idea how I might be feeling.

He was still suited up when I opened the door to let him in.

'Charlie. Good to see you again. How are you tonight?' He strode in past me as though he were entering his own dining room or something, and I didn't make any move to stop him. It felt nice to have someone take control of the situation.

'I was going to go to bed quite soon,' I confessed. 'We didn't go for our usual walk tonight …'

'I know. Terzo informed me of your university's insistence that you return for your studies. I suggested we forge a sick note, but –'

'He already said that. I said no.'

'That's what Terzo said,' said Secundo, with an amused little raise of his eyebrows. 'Perfectly understandable. But I just wanted to check you were OK?'

This was such a curveball that I stared at him, wide-eyed, for several full seconds.

'I'm not great,' I said eventually. 'He didn't seem … himself. When I told him I had to leave, I mean.'

Even explaining it in the most vague manner possible brought fresh tears to my eyes, and I could feel myself snotting up again as Secundo pondered my answer. Polar opposites facing one another. I wished I'd worn a suit. I'd never truly fit in with Ghost, I could see that all of a sudden.

'Hmm.' Secundo said. 'Do you think he is angry with you?'

I nodded, dragging my sleeve across my nose. I didn't feel like manners mattered much any more. Instead of wrinkling his nose or flinching, though, he actually smiled.

'He is not. Trust me.' He was more earnest than I'd imagined he could be, at odds with his suit and indoor sunglasses. 'I have known him all his life and he is the most emotional little _stronzetto_ I have ever met. If you told him you had to leave and he was truly angry he would simply have hired a taxi to drive you back to London there and then. If he didn't seem himself, then he did not want you to see that he is upset.'

It didn't wash with me even still. 'He won't be upset. I'm just his assistant, not his …' I didn't dare say it, or anything like it. I just waved my hand in the hope I'd be understood.

'It is possible to get on with your colleagues. So I am told,' Secundo said. When I didn't react, he finally made himself comfortable on my bed. He still managed to carry himself formidably when he was sitting down: just like his brother. 'Look, Charlie. He is an idiot, I will not deny that. It is one thing our father and I agree on. But he is also a good person who is trying to do his best in every area of his life. Maybe his methods are a little different to what we are used to here, but you can't deny he gets results. Father is cynical still, of course. Terzo had his moments when he was first made Papa, and I think that is still what our father sees when he watches the way he commands rituals. But he no longer parties, or brings hoards and hoards of people back to the sauna …' That got a reaction from me, and I wasn't sure if it was a positive or negative one – either way, it must have been obvious I was thinking about it which made him chuckle, a low, throaty sound. 'Yes, I have tried to go in there for its intended use only to find it otherwise occupied once or twice. But he understands that that lifestyle diverted from his true purpose, and even though I know his heart is not always completely in our message … you would never know because he works so hard at making the rituals such a good place to be, for so many people. That is why, I think, he hired you. He saw something in you and you make him a better frontman, a better servant of the clergy. And without you around …' He shrugged. 'I do not know. I just know he is going to miss you, that's all.'

'Then why not tell me that?'

'Ah. He is not too good at wording his feelings. Especially not when they are directed at staff.'

 _Staff._ As reassured as I was by Secundo's probable explanation, that last word almost undid all of his hard work. I had, I was sure, been crying at the loss I was going to have to deal with when I left Papa and returned to uni. Papa, though, was going to miss me like a good secretary who made a CEO's professional life a lot more streamlined. There was an imbalance there that I was too embarrassed to bring up.


	13. Brighton Rock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie enjoys their last night with Papa by the sea, and a lot of things are left unsaid that should probably have been said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really really want to be alternately updating this and We'll Just Have to Face It This Time, but I've almost finished the draft of story and work is eating a lot of my time right now, so that's why this one is getting so much attention - I can just copy and edit bits as and when! I promise I know what's happening with WJHTFITT, it's just ... you know, sitting down to commit it to paper/computer!

The last day went far too quickly.

Even without seeing him, even spending most of my day on the beach with textbooks and ice cream, hours melted like the vanilla dribbles making sticky trails down my hands. Once or twice I did consider calling him up and asking if I could maybe sit it on their important clergy business since I wouldn't have the chance again, but I knew in my heart of hearts it would be even less likely that way. He couldn't risk me seeing the inner workings of Ghost and then spreading them around once I was no longer under contract. Thinking about it left a taste in my mouth. I really was just an employee, and this really was just a mutual termination of my employment.

I watched the ritual from the crowd again, but this time I told him I was going to do it. I stayed a few rows back to make sure he didn't pay me any special attention, but there were still several moments of lingering eye contact and many of the best photo opportunities seemed to happen in my eyeline. Somehow, the ritual calmed me in a way I hadn't thought it would: I'd been fully expecting to have a breakdown partway through or something of that ilk. At least, I supposed, I could do _this_ again. There was nothing stopping me coming to rituals in the future, perhaps even in other countries. I couldn't hit Europe this time but one day I would have a job, I would be able to take leave, and I could take ownership of what I did with that time. And I could turn up at the stage door afterwards and maybe, if he was in the mood and nobody needed him elsewhere, we could go for a walk. Maybe.

If he didn't hire a replacement to do that for him.

 _No._ I couldn't think like that, or I really would have that breakdown. The job hadn't existed before me, he'd created it _for_ me. I had to believe I was irreplaceable or my heart would break.

Why would it break? Why was I so invested in this?

OK, I will admit. There may have been tears during Monstrance Clock. But they were long gone by the time I met Papa outside the stage door, after he'd hung around signing tickets and albums. It was easy to forget the previous night when he approached me, looking energised and ready to take on the world.

'Tell me we are going to the beach?' he said, raising an eyebrow.

'Of course we're going to the beach,' I said. 'Come on.'

First, I'd found a 24-hour fish and chip shop, so we made a detour to pick up polystyrene trays of what was in essence just carbs, oil and mushy peas. It struck me that I'd never seen him eat before. I knew he did, but I also wouldn't have been surprised if he'd spent all his time away from me lying perfectly still with his arms crossed over his chest.

We walked more slowly, navigating the soft, shifting sand as we made our way towards the marina. It was a pleasant evening so the beach wasn't empty, but we were unlikely to be disturbed as long as we minded our own business.

'Hmmm.' I was trying to talk through a mouth full of chips, and they took some swallowing. 'They're not bad. Remind me to take you to the Magpie one day, though. That's nearer to me and they do the best fish and chips in the entire _world._ '

'You do know that fish and chips are a very British thing? The world isn't necessarily trying that hard to compete with you,' Papa said.

'You know what I mean.'

'I do. Sorry.' Papa was trying to stab at his last few crispy bits with his wooden fork without much success – how he'd managed to finish his off so quickly without me noticing, I had no idea. 'I was just thinking, if you were coming with us it might be up to me to show you some new experiences for a change. I'd leave the location scouting to you but I think I must know many countries better than you do. It would've been a pleasure to see your face on sampling your first real Italian risotto …'

'I'll come and see you one day,' I said. 'I won't be a student forever. When I have real money and real annual leave I can do what I want with it.'

'Of course. You're going to be a computer scientist. I don't understand exactly how that translates to the workplace but I can imagine jobs in that field pay well enough for long trips across Europe to see as many rituals as possible.'

'You're making it sound like a dream when I know all you'll want is my money. Now that you've converted me to a proper fan.'

Papa redoubled his stabbing efforts, giving the tray his full concentration.

'More than just a fan, I hope,' he said, his tone of voice lowering.

I nodded, before realising he couldn't see me do it. 'Yes. Of course.'

Though I wasn't sure exactly what I was agreeing to, I was sure I agreed to it.

He gave up on his scraps. Deftly, he dropped his little wooden fork into the tray and folded the whole thing in half in one movement. 'Charlie, I must apologise for last night. Secundo told me I rather upset you. That was not my intention.'

'I …' An apology should've been welcome, but I found I suddenly didn't need to hear it. 'It's fine. I think I understand.'

'No, it's not fine. I accepted your decision with terrible grace, or rather no grace at all, and for that I am truly sorry.'

There was a new sound coming from inside my body, audible even over the calm rushing of the waves and the sea lapping against the boats in the marina. My heart. It was bracing itself for something, drumming against the back of my throat when it should very much have been pumping away somewhere much further down. It was making me feel almost sick.

'You just really don't want me to go, do you?' I said, in a rush.

A big risk, maybe. But he gazed over at me and, slowly, shook his head.

'No, Charlie. I don't.'

That was, to my dismay, as much as we spoke about that. The rest of the evening was spent in much the same way as our other evenings had been spent: complaining about his father, sure, but mostly just being a bit silly and enjoying our surroundings. The lights from behind us were reflected in the sea, moving gently along with its tide like floating candles, and there was a part of me that wanted to make _something_ of this. I should have bought him a goodbye present. I should have prepared a speech. I should have thought ahead and got it into my head that this really was, at least for now, _it._

But that wasn't how it transpired. We watched boats in the marina for as long as we could handle the chill of the salty air, then we turned around and walked back to the hotel. And because none of that was much different from how any other evening had ended, I still didn't feel like this one was any different.

We reached his room first, and he stopped outside the door.

'Charlie, I don't know what to say,' he said. 'It's been … wonderful to have you on board. I hope this isn't the true end to your time with us.'

'I hope it isn't,' I said. 'You never know what the future might bring, I suppose.'

His gaze sort of drifted to a spot I wasn't convinced was physically present in this hotel corridor, and I knew he was thinking of his predecessors' limited runs as Papa. But he shook it off with ease, offering me a sad smile. He looked like he wanted to offer me more, although what that might have looked like I wasn't sure. In the end, he settled on extending his right hand. Still clad in its white glove. I'd never, ever seen him look anything less than regal.

'All the best,' he said. 'Your taxi will be outside the hotel at seven tomorrow, so get a good night's sleep, huh?'

I reached out to shake his hand. 'Yeah, of course. Don't be a stranger, though, will you? I mean … if your dad really does hate everything you've done and kicks you out the band, maybe you could take an extended break in London?'

I sounded desperate, I knew I did, but if there was any chance this was the last time I was ever going to see him then I really didn't care.

Instead of the one, firm, up-and-down handshake my dad had always taught me was professional and proper, we clutched one another for the entirety of our goodbye.

'This isn't _la fine_ , Charlie, don't you worry,' he said. 'Don't you worry.'

He patted the back of my hand with the one that wasn't already holding onto me – then, all at once, he'd let me go, and I was alone in the corridor.


	14. London Calling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's mostly just a bit depressing tbf sorry xox

I know. I should've said something. But I couldn't work out what I really wanted to say to him when we were there together still – it wasn't like some sweeping confession of feelings would've been appropriate even if I was sure feelings were what I'd be confessing to. I really had no idea. Even trying to mull it over on my own, when I had a couple of hours in a taxi to do nothing but think, I couldn't come up with the goods.

The meeting with uni was about as standard as they come. Dan was understanding and kind, which was the absolute least I deserved but it was appreciated. I never did tell him the truth about where I'd been, but now that I was back he didn't seem to need the truth from me. He just seemed incredibly relieved he hadn't lost one of his students, and that I was on track to finish all of my coursework if I only got my head down and finished it. Considering how much free time I'd had over the last week or so, I didn't seem to've made much use of it.

That was what I was panicking over when Laura sprang a huge hug on me in the flat later that day. We hadn't had much chance for a catch-up yet. She'd been out and about since I'd got back, and had spent most of the day in the uni library, but she'd designated that as her specific working time so that when we were slumped together in front of her laptop monitor watching some bullshit or other, she was free to pester me for every detail she'd missed.

So I obliged. My sleeping pattern was a bit screwed up, so I knew I had plenty of time to do work when she'd gone to bed. I indulged her every question, gave her detailed mental maps of everywhere I'd been with Papa, recounted every conversation I could remember. I tried my best to keep emotion out of the whole thing. I didn't want to sound like I was gushing as much as I wanted to gush, and I certainly didn't want to start choking on sobs the way I knew I would if I started trying to puzzle out his behaviour on the last couple of nights we'd spent together. Laura wanted the story and I gave her the story, as it might have been told in an adventure film. Not a romance. No, definitely not.

'You should've kissed him,' was what she said, when I'd finished my epic tale. 'Really. I'm not saying that as a jealous fan who wants to know what it might feel like, I'm saying it because you so obviously should've kissed him.'

I'd been a bit afraid of that.

'I shouldn't've,' I said, with a sigh. 'It really wasn't like that, I promise. I was his PA, and we both know he hired me because he liked my calming influence … or whatever. That's all this was. We clicked in a purely assistant-rock star way.'

Laura straightened her back so she was sitting upright, her body lengthened and imposing. She turned to face me dead on and her face was set.

'I'm going to ask you a straight question now, Charlie, and I want a one-word answer out of you. No hedging or shit, you understand?'

I shrank back a bit, into our giant IKEA cushions. 'What?'

'Understand?'

'Yes! I understand. Ask the damn question.'

'Do you have feelings for him?'

I sank a little deeper into my cushion nest. It was a far easier question to answer than I would've expected: when someone had posed it, that was. Everything that was going on in my head was a bit of a mush, but if I had to consider my perspective on it, and my perspective only? I didn't need to hedge. I knew what I had to say, between two best friends.

I nodded, defeated. 'Yes.'

In contrast to me, Laura's whole posture stiffened, straightening yet more in triumph.

'I knew it. You need to see him again.' It was satisfying, I had to admit, not to be shot down on finally confessing my feelings - even if the confession wasn't to the person it perhaps ought to've been directed at.

'It doesn't matter, though, does it? I only know _I_ like _him_ ,' I said. 'It might just be the effect he has on people. In fact, once I'm back in the swing of uni, I bet it goes away. I was just caught up in the majesty of the whole thing, no doubt. Everyone … everyone fucking fancies him, don't they? That's the _point._ He wouldn't go for someone like me.'

She's relaxed again, slightly. She was still upright, still in charge of this conversation, but she was now wearing a warmer smile.

'I've known you – what? A year and a half, now?' I nodded. 'Aha. D'you remember that night in Underworld when I had to save you from that bloke? Right. He was actually pretty fit, and he wasn't being creepy or anything. He just really liked the look of you. But you weren't bothered at all, were you?'

It wasn't how I remembered it. But trying to see it from another's point of view … was he indeed only as gross as I thought he'd been because I hadn't been interested in him?

'No …' I said slowly. 'No. It just – it freaks me out, someone thinking they can be interested in you when they've just met you like that.'

'Yeah, all right. That's fine, that's just the way you are. I've also known you date literally one person. Jack, yeah?' Another nod. Jack had been a brief thing and I wasn't sure I liked where this was going. 'Right. You and Jack. You danced around each other for months because you were friends on your course, and every time we met up you'd whine to me about the sort of conversation you had and whether it meant anything, and every time I listened and told you that it was _so_ obvious they liked you. And then I met you together and I couldn't breathe for chemistry, or whatever.'

Jack and I had only been together for as long as they'd lasted at UCL – they'd decided uni wasn't for them about two months later. It had been a blow, to say the least, when they'd moved back to fucking St. Andrews.

'My point being,' Laura said, clearly sensing my discomfort, 'that you only like people when there's something _there._ You don't do it one-sided, or just because someone's hot. I don't think you're capable of doing it one-sided. So if you really do feel something for Papa, I'm willing to bet it's because there was something there to feel. D'you get me?'

I was about to say something, though I don't know what, when our buzzer went off. Laura offered me an apologetic smile, then hopped up to answer it.

'Yeah? Yeah! Oh, that's fine, send them up.'

I raised my eyebrows at her. 'We don't get visitors?'

'DPD. What have you ordered?'

'Nothing, I've been away. Must be for you?'

But it was for me. The box that was delivered was huge and heavy and had my name on it.

'I bet I know who's sent that,' Laura said, with a sly grin. 'Get it opened.'

I had some idea, too. I had no idea, however, what on Earth was actually inside. We hauled the box into the front room, and Laura grabbed a pair of scissors from the kitchen so I could hack into the copious amounts of tape that were holding the whole thing together.

It was vinyl. So much vinyl – by the look of it, it was at least one pressing of everything Ghost had ever released. All sealed. And on top, a chilled, insulated envelope, alongside a smaller envelope with _Charlie_ written on the front in elaborate purple handwriting. I'd never seen his handwriting, but I could have told you that it was his from a mile away.

'All right, what's he sent that's had to be refrigerated?' Laura said, picking up the bigger envelope.

It was well-sealed. After quite a lot of tearing and hacking, I managed to break into it, revealing a ball of mozzarella. Proper Italian stuff.

'Oh, the little ...' I rolled my eyes with a sharp laugh. 'As if this came all the way from Italy. He was bitching about my shit taste in cheese when we had a McDonald's in Leeds, so I guess ...'

I just shrugged, then laughed again, this time nervously. The other envelope was waiting. Seized by a sudden wave of nauseous emotion that I couldn't quite pinpoint, I thrust it into Laura's hands.

'Read it,' I said, through a tightened throat. 'Please. I don't think I can.'

Laura stroked the top edge of the envelope slowly. 'Are you sure?'

I couldn't handle her saying it like there might be something inside for my eyes only. I nodded. 'Yep. Go ahead.'

She was much faster at it than I would've been, giving it a quick glance before starting to read: presumably vetting it. Maybe if it had said something she thought would upset me, she could edit it verbally. I found myself hoping she would, that I'd never find out what was actually written there that should have been said back in the hotel.

'“Charlie, _mi manchi._ So, so much. If you play these in the dark on a night perhaps you can pretend you are in Europe with me?”' She smiled at that. '“And enjoy the cheese. You'll never go back to your shitty English duplicate afterwards. _Ciao –_ for now.” And then he's put a kiss and a circle and a kiss.'

I took a couple of deep breaths in and out, trying to steady myself. 'All right. What does _mi manchi_ mean?'

'Well, if it's anything like the Andrea Bocelli song?' I didn't stop her to ask if she was super into Andrea Bocelli – I hadn't had her down as the type, but that wasn't important right now. 'I think he misses you. A lot.'

I really, really tried to stop myself. But it was something about being there, with Laura, in the life I'd come to know as normal but was now wondering whether it was right … faced with a small link to the life I'd started to believe was _mine_? I knew I'd started crying because of Laura's reaction before I realised it had happened: tears came without warning, and then her arms were around me and I was clinging onto her way too tightly and making an absolute mess of the shoulder of her denim jacket, but she didn't say anything if she minded. She just held me to her, stroked my back, and let me cry myself into a state of complete exhaustion.


	15. Does Your Papa Know?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Well he's not just gonna let Charlie crack on with life without putting up a bit of a fight, is he?

Finishing my essays to such tight deadlines was like pulling teeth. I'd thought that coming back to London and doing my work in the places I used to do my work would improve my concentration, but I hadn't factored in the new influx of emotions I was struggling to manage. There'd been a time when uni work had been a pain in the arse but something that needed doing, and once I sat down to do it it did sort of happen. Now, I had to just about quadruple my efforts to get the same amount of words committed to my documents. I could sit and work for hours but I would never find that 'groove', the one that sometimes came at four in the morning and sometimes directly after a lecture if I didn't have much else to do, but that always came at some point.

So it was that I channelled everything I was feeling – the rage, the angst, the sorrow, all of it – into those word counts. It wasn't the best combination in the world but it was the only one that could guarantee I got anything done. If the two hadn't fused I would have spent all of my time moping around and none of it doing any work. In a way, it was maybe a good thing I had so much that I actually _had_ to do. I didn't feel like doing very much else at all.

There was work, too, of course. I only spent a few days at home over Easter because when we had holiday from uni, Laura and I could sign up to work way more events at the Forum, and that offered some respite. Most days over Easter we indulged in long sleep-ins, lots of coffee and chatting shit, then spent our evenings at work watching all manner of music acts. It maybe should've been more of a distraction than it actually was, though. It's weird how you can be in a room with hundreds of other people, being dazzled by lights and feeling music thunder through you, but still be elsewhere in your thoughts. I saw some bands I was really into, but there wasn't a gig went by where I didn't, at least at some point, wish I was watching Ghost.

'Have you spoken to him since he sent you the records?' Laura asked me on the tube one night, when we were on our way back from working The Cribs.

We hadn't been talking about Papa, but there was obviously nobody else she could've been referring to.

'No,' I said. It wasn't a stupid question, but it almost felt like it had been. 'It's not that sort of relationship, is it? He had me on board for a purpose, and that's over now. It'd be weird to just message him with some “how's things?” bullshit.'

'It would not,' Laura said. 'Look at their tour schedule and text him when you know he's just come off-stage. He'd be over the moon.'

'Likely he's got someone else ready to collect him off the stage,' I dismissed. I really didn't want to get into this conversation. We didn't talk about him much and I'd assumed it was because Laura knew it hurt. 'Besides, he doesn't strike me as the type to sit pissing about on his phone for hours at a time. I think he was strictly business with his.'

'Hmmm.' She nodded. 'Doesn't surprise me.'

But I did check, out of interest, when we got home. And the European tour was over. I'd missed all of it.

The next pressing matter was that of exams. They didn't seem as real as the coursework, though, since they'd be sat on one occasion and it was up to me as to how much prep I did or didn't do. It wasn't like I could forget about them, though. Lectures and labs were constant reminders of what we needed to know, to the point where it started getting old. Instead of pressuring me into revising, it made me want to ignore the pressure – which was what, most of the time, I ended up doing.

They were getting scarily close when I got an unexpected, yet delightful, text late one night.

 _Hello! We're getting ready to take our mission to the USA and I can't help but think that it would be far more fun with you on board, Charlie. Particularly since that_ bastardo _of a father of mine is miraculously better. How is university going? Xox_

I was lying on my bed, watching some YouTube video of people exploring abandoned theme parks, when it appeared at the top of my screen. That name: Papa III. My whole body shivered of its own accord, a warm, pleasant sensation that woke me up just a little bit.

I read it a few times over, then texted Laura. _You awake?_

She responded by coming straight into my room, in her Marauder's Map lounge pants and old Camden Rocks t-shirt.

'What's up?' she said.

I just held my phone out to her, and watched her read the message with bated breath.

'Why did you need to haul me in here for that?' she said, when she'd made doubly sure that she'd read everything and that it wasn't worth me freaking out over. 'Just reply! He clearly wants to hear from you, he asked you a question!'

'But what do I say?' I moaned. 'Would it sound super needy if I said I wanted to go over with him too? Would it be too heavy if I asked him how he's getting on with his dad? It might just be a throwaway message because he realises it's been ages and he feels bad, for God's sake.'

'You're turning this whole thing into a mind game and that's not how it's meant to work,' said Laura. She sat down on the end of my bed and clapped her hands against her thighs. 'You're Charlie. You don't do dating and manipulation, you do feelings. Reply with whatever you think you ought to reply with.'

'I miss you more than I could ever explain, least of all to myself?'

'Reply with whatever you think you ought to reply with that actually makes sense as a reply to what he's said, I mean.'

I was smiling, though. 'I know. I'm not going to be an idiot. I guess I just needed someone else to confirm I'm not one.'

_I'm sure it would be more fun with me there, too. I have exams coming up but after that I'm on holiday for the summer, thank God. Have you not got some other bodyguard to big you up to your dad? Xxx_

I signed it off with Laura, of course, and she waited with me until he replied.

_No. You were a fluke. How could I replace you? Xox_

*

In hindsight, it was probably a stupid move. At the time, though, I swear I did talk it through with Laura, and she did agree that it wouldn't be the end of the world, and that it might in fact be the solution to a problem I'd never realised I had until recently.

'What are your grounds going to be, though?' she said. 'You can't go into SRS and and explain that you need to defer final year because you're travelling to America with a Satan church.'

'Is it really all that different from a Mormon going out there on a mission?' I said.

'Well, yeah, because you don't actually believe in God or Satan or anything, do you?' Laura said. 'You just want to sleep with the priest.'

I ignored that part, though my undoubtedly scarlet cheeks didn't. 'All right, I'll just say I'm travelling,' I said. 'It's not a lie, is it? And maybe afterwards I could go _actual_ travelling. The tour finishes way before the end of the uni year.'

Laura raised her eyebrows suggestively. 'If I didn't know better, I'd say you're picturing a gap year in which you and Papa Emeritus journey to far-off, secluded destinations …'

'Oh, God, stop it,' I moaned. I could feel the heat in my cheeks redoubling. 'You need to help me bring my expectations down. This might just carry on the way it went in the UK.'

It was the way I was dealing with the whole idea: if I didn't have high hopes for re-joining Ghost in the USA, when it was indeed nothing more than a continuation of my professional services I couldn't be disappointed.

So, with Laura's blessing but yet to explain to my family or the university, as soon as my last exam was finished I walked to our Student Registry Services office and declared my intention to defer my last year of uni. The woman who dealt with me in a side office, who couldn't have been much older than me, was very friendly and understanding until she brought my details up on her computer.

'Hmm.' Her forehead tightened. 'Charlie? Have you already been into the office about this?'

'No. I only …' But I cut myself off quickly. I had to think about where she might've got that idea from before I dug myself into a hole again like I had done last time, and there was only one possibility. The US tour had already started, after all.

The woman finally relaxed and looked up from her monitor again.

'It's just you're already down as deferring. You apparently contacted us a couple of weeks ago and it all went through then. You're going travelling with your father?'

 _Father_ was one word for him.

I called him the minute I left the office, and he answered with a laugh in place of a greeting. Laughter wasn't a sound I associated particularly strongly with him, but hearing it felt like home.

'I know why you're calling,' he said.

'I hate you so much, _dad_. You should've told me you'd done that, I wanted it to be a surprise when I told you!'

'You got in too late. Did you not think I might want to surprise you too?'


	16. Catch a Tampa Flight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With their next year at uni finally deferred, Charlie is free to fly out to join Ghost on their US tour supporting Iron Maiden! If only Papa were as happy to see them ...

It was weird, how little trepidation I felt at the prospect of travelling to another continent on my own with a view to moving around the world for the next four months. The excitement swelled so much that it crushed any nerves or even upset. The only thing that had me in tears was saying goodbye to Laura. I did feel terrible about the fact that it hadn't struck me earlier that we couldn't re-do our last year together once she'd already done hers and I hadn't.

I felt even worse when she burst into tears as we waited for my bus at Wembley Central. It was a mark of being in London that nobody paid us much attention: in either of our home towns, I could imagine everyone edging slowly away from us while pretending they were doing nothing of the sort. I lost no time in wrapping both my arms around her.

'Sorry,' she sniffed. I kissed the top of her head. 'I know this is a good thing, and I swear I'm happy about it, but you know I'm going to miss you like crazy, right?'

'I'm going to miss you, too. I could never have imagined not finishing uni together.'

She let me go, wiping her eyes and chuckling to herself. 'Shit … this is so embarrassing. Sorry. You'll be glad to be rid of me.'

'Don't say that,' I said. 'Don't. You know it isn't true.'

She'd had a momentary loss of composure, that was all, but it was enough to almost reverse my thinking. It was too late, I knew. I was about to get on my first bus to travel to Heathrow, where I'd get on a flight to Orlando. Apparently there was even going to be a driver at the other end, ready to take me straight to Tampa – if everything went smoothly I'd arrive at the end of the show.

And the entire thing, even more than it had done that first night Papa and I had met, seemed very, very stupid.

I had to swallow sobs when I got on my bus. I waved at Laura from the window until long after she was out of sight – again, nobody in London gave enough of a shit about other peoples' business to pay the crazy person waving at nobody much attention.

It didn't take long, though. When I thought about what I was really doing, and where I'd be doing it, and how happy I'd been doing it here. When I thought about the hot Florida sunshine and the crazy road trip we'd be taking around the country, then the triumphant return to Europe for the end of the tour, and the places I could research to take Papa where I'd be just as dazzled by them as he was.

When I thought about Papa and I, almost every night, exploring cities like Chicago and Phoenix and San Francisco together …

I read all about Tampa on the flight. Like many places in Florida it wasn't far from the beach. I didn't have the advantage of understanding the transport systems in America the way I did at home, but I would have a driver – were they there for us both, or would I have to rely on walking? It was very difficult, but equally exciting, to picture somewhere I had no knowledge of. Fanciful images swam through my head as I drifted in and out of a doze. There was an aquarium. Of course it'd be shut, but the idea of the two of us, wandering between huge tanks of water in semi-darkness, was delightful. There was Busch Gardens, again very unlikely to be available to us, but I was lost in a fantasy of exploring shadowy, still roller coasters and watching the animals as they slept …

I hadn't decided on a destination by the time we landed, sleepy and enthralled by the heatwave off the tarmac even at this time of night, and I was met by my driver. His name, according to a badge he had pinned to his front, was Phil – and he was a ghoul. Huh. I'd never imagined they'd be able – or allowed – to drive.

'Hey, Phil,' I said. 'Are you taking me to Tampa?'

I'd fully expected a silent nod, maybe a grunt at most. But he surprised me with his eloquence and smooth, polite voice. 'Yeah, the car's just outside. Can I take your bag?'

He must have seen my utter shock at his measured, perfectly understandable question, but he was polite enough not to react and make me feel like even more of a prick.

He might've been chatty, but I never got the chance to find out, because I fell sound asleep almost as soon as we left the airport.

If I'd been awake, maybe the nerves would've kicked in. I hadn't seen Papa since Brighton, after all, and that had been over two months ago. It still felt as though this might not have been real, even though I was definitely sitting in a large Chevy, zipping down the right-hand side of a freeway, in a heavy sort of heat that I would never have experienced in the UK. It was a fantastical idea even now, that I should be seeing him somewhere so alien. Perhaps it made sense, though. If the entire situation was fantastical, maybe it would start to feel as though it were actually happening.

I started to stir once the car pulled off the freeway and the rumbles of the engine changed as Phil drove us through Tampa. I knew it was a city, but it wasn't a city in the sense I was used to: it seemed to be made entirely of gigantic banks rather than shops or anything like that, almost as though I were back in the financial district of Leeds where I'd taken Papa along the Aire. Phil must have caught me looking out of the window in quiet awe. He chanced a glance my way when we'd stopped at a set of traffic lights.

'I'm sorry we're probably going to miss the show,' he said. 'I think Iron Maiden will be getting towards Hallowed Be Thy Name by now.'

His voice had startled me, but he sounded so unexpectedly chill that I recovered fast. 'Oh, it's OK,' I said, with a real smile. 'I'll have plenty of chances to see Iron Maiden over the next couple of months. Have you seen them before?'

'Oh, yeah. I've been there at the side of the stage for every night of this tour so far. They're so fucking good … I guess you'll probably get to meet them, too.'

The prospect filled me with excitement, but only a fraction of the excitement I was beginning to feel knowing how close we were to Papa.

I don't know why it struck me then. I'd known this leg of the tour was in support of Iron Maiden – I suppose I just hadn't considered the implications of that. The very first instance of accompanying Papa away from a music venue had happened in order to hide him from crazed fans. This wouldn't be the case at an arena where they weren't the headline act, surely? After their show, the fans should still be in the venue for the band they were actually there for. Ghost could stick around to watch and then leave without incident, presumably, or if they really wanted to sneak off couldn't they do so while Iron Maiden were on?

In short – why the hell had Papa flown me to the USA, at his expense?

My heart sort of fluttered, as cliched as that might sound.

Phil dropped me behind the arena. He instructed me to wait while he went to the stage door to announce my presence – he bade me goodbye so I hoped to God the message got through and I wasn't left floundering on the streets of Tampa. I'd dressed for a cool aeroplane, and hadn't dumped my light jacket in my suitcase yet, so I was starting to sweat. How was it so hot at night? It was probably gorgeous if you were on a beach or something, but the pavement seemed to be doubling the intensity, the darkness closing in on me so that it felt like an oven.

Then the door opened, and the face that met me told me everything I needed to know about why I might have been flown out here.

He didn't stroll out with his usual confidence, and his eyes weren't searching me out with bright excitement. He found me, and he froze. His face was tight with anguish, his hands wringing together in their white gloves.

'Papa,' I said, trying to inject some brightness into my voice. 'Ta-da!'

He started to move again, walking towards me with urgency. 'Oh, Charlie –'

He threw both arms around me but it wasn't in the joy of reunion: within seconds he was shaking with violent, noisy sobs, and my lungs seemed to contract in despair.

'Hey … hey. What's happened?' Tentatively, I wrapped my arms around him, too. I was caught between horror, at the surprise of a greeting like this, and a desperate sorrow that stemmed from his sorrow and my not knowing what to do to make it better. It tugged at something inside my torso like a fish hook, and I absolutely hated the way it made me feel. 'Come on. I'm here. It's OK.'

It, obviously, was not OK at all. He was squeezing me to the point of pain.

This felt like the wrong way round. I would never have said it, but it really did. And I wasn't sure I was handling it very well. All I could do was keep holding him for as long as he allowed it – or needed it?

He felt too small in my arms like this. 

'Can we get out of here?' His voice was tiny and thick. His grip loosened but he still had both arms around me, and I stroked his back as I nodded. For the first time in God knows how long, I scouted out the street around us – it had been deserted, but now I could see Phil waiting by the stage door. He gave me the tiniest of nods, and moved back to the Chevy without making a sound.


	17. Pier 60

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What the hell is wrong with Papa? Is this why he needs his emotional support PA? Will a walk on the beach with the best sunset in the world solve anything at all?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Charlie is watching Klystron 9 at one point in this chapter. Whenever I miss Florida I bring this up https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFd9WRHpw6E and get all emotional.

It seemed like the natural thing to do to keep one arm around Papa as we headed to the car. Both of us sat in the back: I got in first, then when he'd sat down and closed the door, I reached for his hand. I didn't want to _not_ be touching him. I couldn't have explained how but he was giving off this desperation for something tangible. I had no idea what was wrong, so I had no idea what to say, and I had no idea if he would even tell me in front of Phil anyway. But I did know that I could hold on to him, in some capacity. And, judging by the way he gripped me back, he appreciated it.

'Erm …' He cleared his throat, trying to level his voice, though I suspected the damage was done if he was worried about Phil having seen him in such a state. 'Can we go … away a bit? Further out?'

'I know the perfect place, Papa, if you can wait forty minutes or so?' Phil said. His voice, now, was warm and reassuring, and Papa grunted in appreciation. Perhaps he trusted Phil over anyone else. 'Just over the Courtney Campbell. It'll be quiet, I promise.'

Perhaps Phil had been taking my place. Perhaps he'd searched this place up during the day, the way I might have done if I'd been on the tour with them and old enough to rent a car in America. Papa's hand and mine stayed linked for the whole journey, but nobody spoke again, a shared understanding that there weren't words for the moment. I watched out of the window, as lights flared and flashed away, illuminating fewer buildings and more houses, until I could see the ocean. The Gulf of Mexico.

I'd wondered if he would take us to the beach. And, indeed, when he pulled the car over we were at the end of a strip of seafront shops with sand in sight, as well as a magnificent pier.

'I'll be circling,' Phil said. 'Just let me know when you want me to pick you up and I'll meet you here, OK?'

I thanked him sincerely, then Papa and I slid out onto the still-scorching street.

There were still no words, but we understood one another well enough to start making our way to the beach. We weren't alone. I supposed that was normal in Florida, when it was still hot enough to be wearing shorts and a t-shirt so late at night. It was quiet enough, though, especially when we headed away from the pier. Voices faded on the sea air, the atmosphere filled with the tide and not much else. I waited until there was nobody at all within earshot before I broke our silence.

'You don't have to tell me what's wrong,' I said. I was, genuinely, frightened of asking. Nothing that could break Papa like that would have been pleasant to relay. 'But if there's anything I can do to make the situation better then I really want you to tell me that.'

'There is nothing you can do,' he said. 'I'm glad to have you here, but there is nothing you can do.'

Without warning, he swerved. He kept the same pace, but now he was walking towards the sea, and somehow I could do nothing but follow him.

I had a feeling he wasn't going to stop when he reached the water, not least because there wasn't much light to see by and it was difficult to tell when wet sand became sea, but he must have been more alert than I would've been because he stopped as abruptly as he'd changed direction. He didn't seem to want to look at me, that was it. Even without seeing his face any more I could imagine it, gazing off towards the horizon without seeing it, smudged corpse paint hidden by the low light. I stayed behind him, a metre or so away. Close enough to hear him if he spoke again, or even whispered. I wasn't going to force him, but I was ready, just in case.

He'd grounded himself so that he was ready, too. 'It's all gone to hell since we came out here,' he said.

I did consider making a joke about his use of the word 'hell' – that was where he _wanted_ everything to be going, surely? – but I knew him well enough now to know that now was not the time for that sort of humour.

'We are touring with Iron Maiden,' he said, to the horizon. 'This should be the pinnacle of my career. They have put on consistently exciting shows since I was young and I could learn so much from them. But that only means we are working with their crowd, not our own, and my father has made it very clear that I am not doing a satisfactory enough job of …. well. I don't even know what he _fucking_ wants me to do.' Out of some sort of compulsion, perhaps, he bent down to pick up a stone from the sand, and hurled it into the water with surprising strength. He wasn't going for elegance, no skimming the sea's gently lapping surface: it flew but it splashed, ripples shimmering in the moonlight.

I took a deep breath. 'Surely he wants you to impress a whole new set of potential fans? Thousands a night? And I'm sure you're doing a more than satisfactory job, because you never do anything else. You're a consummate professional.'

'You've met my father,' Papa spat. 'Consummate professionalism has a completely different definition in his mind and even if the crowds are enjoying what I do, he will ignore that if he doesn't think I fit in with his image for Ghost.'

I hardly dared ask, but I had to admit, I was genuinely curious. Papa had told me before, after all, that most of the singers worked a two-year stint before being switched up. 'And what if he doesn't think you fit in with his image?'

He shook his head, his entire stance sagging towards the water.

'Who the fuck knows?' he said. 'Secundo remains involved with the clergy but I don't think I would want that. I am not as devoted to the cause. I never have been. But you would never know, from my performance! It is only because _he_ knows that he sees it. And he hates it. He sees this as a huge chance that I am completely blowing and I can't imagine what punishment he has in store for the son he believes is making a mockery of his church …'

I'd had it at that. This was worse than the crying, this self-doubt and anguish at the father who didn't realise what a gift he had in his son. 'You're making a mockery of nothing,' I said, and I was unable to hide my anger. 'You're doing Ghost your way and I wish you could see the effect you have on those crowds. Your father is a prick if _he_ can't see that.'

I'd been about to move towards him, but at my words he took several long steps forward.

'He may be a prick but unfortunately for me he also runs the show!' Papa fell onto his knees, the sea level with his waist, and buried his face in his hands. 'I'm finished, Charlie. You can say the nicest things in the world about me but it doesn't make a difference. I'm finished. And ... and I need you here to get me through the rest of this tour when I have that knowledge to haunt me the whole time.'

My clothes, I reasoned, were disgusting anyway from the hours and hours in hire cars and aeroplanes. I waded in after him. Mindful that he still didn't seem to want to look at me, I stayed behind him, but I too bent down so that I was kneeling on the shifting sand below the water. I wrapped my arms around his waist and I rested my chin on his right shoulder. I _could've_ said the nicest things in the world about him, and I wanted to, but I had to concede. He was right. The clergy were his family. He knew them inside out, knew their expectations and their personalities, and in comparison all I could offer were empty, stupid words that would never be enough. I just kept both arms around him and, eventually, he relaxed back into me, holding onto my folded arms. I could have sworn he was breathing in time with the waves as they swelled and broke around us.

*

When Phil drove us back to the hotel, I didn't question the fact that I walked straight into Papa's room after him. Seeing him in the harsh light of the lobby had revealed just how sorry a sight he was tonight, his corpse paint streaked and his gorgeous stage clothes damp, wrinkled and covered in grit. I knew I must not have looked much better. I made a mental note to get to know Phil when things had calmed down a bit, maybe find out his poison so I could buy him a massive bottle of it to thank him for putting up with us. He gave me my suitcase and I was sure, if I could have seen his face, that he was smiling warmly when he said goodnight.

In all fairness I hadn't been allocated a room of my own yet, but I imagined it wouldn't have been much different from this one. Standard hotel fare, really, with a double bed, a lower-down single, a desk and chair, a TV and an ensuite. I let the door close behind me before I realised what I'd done, without explicit permission, but Papa didn't say anything about it. He just loosened his collar as he crossed the room to retrieve a bundle of some description from his suitcase. 'Do you mind if I take a shower? You can watch TV for a bit if you want. You don't have to go.'

'By all means shower. I think you need it.' I dumped my suitcase to one side, realising that my clothes were an absolute mess too. 'Do you mind if I change? I don't want to get sand on your bed …'

Once he was locked in the bathroom, I stripped and replaced my sandy jeans with pyjamas as quickly as possible in case he'd forgotten deodorant or clean underwear or something and sprang from the bathroom without warning. I tried to ignore the thrill that started deep in my abdomen at the idea of him bursting in on me semi-dressed. Sick of me to even have thought of that. He needed my emotional support tonight. I moved away from the bathroom door, trying also to rid my mind of the very real idea that he was probably naked on the other side of it.

I did as he suggested, turning the TV on and flopping onto the double bed in front of it. I'd momentarily forgotten I was in a new country, and I sought out a local news channel to remind myself how far away from home we were. There was a map of northern Florida on the screen with some jazzy, news-type music playing, showing me the weather for the coming day. Bloody hot, by British standards especially. Apart from that, I didn't get much chance to absorb the local colour. I was dozing to the hosts' peppy voices within minutes.

I stirred only when the bed beside me sagged. Half-asleep, I initially thought a stranger had broken into the room on opening my eyes. It took an embarrassing amount of time for it to click that this was the first time I had ever seen Papa without his stage ensemble.

He was wearing a black t-shirt, and black boxer shorts, but that wasn't the kicker. It was the face, and the fact that I barely even recognised it. He'd washed off his skull paint and without it, I could hardly believe how much more like a person he looked. With that revelation came the realisation that, until now, I perhaps hadn't thought of him as fully human. He had wrinkles, for fuck's sake. In fact he did look older than I'd expected him to be. How could a bit of face paint have warped my expectations of him so badly?

No, not _badly._ The more I looked at him, the more attuned to him I became. He was just different, that was all. And I had the privilege of seeing him like this because he trusted me enough to be vulnerable – and himself – in front of me.

'It's OK,' he grunted. 'You are allowed to be surprised.'

'I'd forgotten you had a face,' I mumbled. I was still waking up. 'You OK?'

'Much better for a shower,' he said. He made himself comfortable on the other side of the bed, leaning back against the giant pillows the way I had done. 'I just love absorbing the local TV channels. It makes me feel like I'm on holiday.'

'Mmmm … me too. This is so American. I love it.'

I didn't love it enough to stay awake for much more. Not even Papa's presence, in the same bed as me, could keep me alert now. The next thing I knew, light was waking me up far too early because neither of us had thought to fully close the curtains – and Papa and I were, inexplicably, enveloped in one another's arms.


	18. Nashville Nights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Papa tries to apologise for his 'unseemly' conduct the previous night, but Charlie doesn't need to hear it <3

What I did (and what I pictured while I did it) in the privacy of my own shower that morning disgusted me afterwards when I actually gave it some thought.

He'd been a broken man. He'd been devastated. I'd held him in the sea, for crying out loud. But the emotional vulnerability meant so much to me, much as I wished that he hadn't had cause to show it. I'd never found myself quite so drawn to him, not even when he was at his most sensual and suggestive on-stage – and I realised that Laura had had a valid point about what I found attractive. I didn't do it one-sided or because someone was hot. I felt something for Papa because there was something there _to_ feel. Even if it had taken a complete breakdown to prove that.

And that changed the way I watched him that night. Finally, I got to see the show in full, again from the side of the stage. Where I'd once been impressed by his ability to flirt with thousands of people at once, I was now fully absorbed in it as though none of the rest of those people were there. His words on the birds and the bees sent my stomach, or rather parts a bit lower than that, swirling. For the first time I made a point of taking photos when he pulled a particularly elegant pose. This happened a lot. He was a particularly elegant man. And he wanted me with him so badly that he'd flown me out to America, from England, so I could be his literal shoulder to cry on.

Excited though I was to see Iron Maiden, I didn't pay as much attention to their set as I would've liked. I think Papa would've steered us away early if he'd known. As it was, we made our escape right at the end of the set, but before they raised the house lights and started with _Always Look on the Bright Side of Life._

No one would be looking for us the way they would've been at Ghost's headline shows, but I'd resumed my old role of scouting out somewhere more relaxed for him to centre himself, and tonight I'd found us another body of water. The Cumberland River, although nothing like any of the quaint rivers I was used to back home, had some green space beside it on the city centre side, and fortunately it wasn't far from Bridgestone Arena.

He'd appeared very much 'himself' onstage tonight, to the point where I'd almost forgotten his emotional turmoil, but now that I had him to myself again, the conversations from the night before were clouding us. We were crossing the last street to the river before he spoke.

'Charlie, I owe you an apology,' he said.

I knew what he wanted to apologise for. I also knew that he didn't need to.

'No,' I said. 'You don't. Last night was –'

'Last night was unprofessional and inappropriate on every level. I didn't ask you to be my counsellor but that was more or less the position I put you in, and I am truly sorry.' We stepped onto the pavement on the other side of the road, then crossed that onto dry grass, which he kept his eyes fixed on as he cleared his throat. 'And I certainly did not hire you to embrace me while I slept. I feel terrible and, if you want to go straight home, I have Phil on standby to take you to the airport.'

I couldn't resist winding him up, despite the tense, sickly sensation building in my stomach. 'Oh, Phil. He's so good, isn't he?'

'He is … a little strange. But I would say the least strange of all of us, if I had to choose. But you are distracting me from my intentions here, Charlie,' Papa said. 'Never mind Phil. I am sorry for crossing so, so many boundaries last night. Tell me if you need that ride. I would understand.'

His role held such power that he couldn't even be vulnerable in front of me without wanting to send me to a whole other continent afterwards. I had to take a second to process that before I spoke again, otherwise I would've just burst into tears at the hopelessness of it all.

'Papa,' I said, with a sigh. 'You _don't_ understand. You don't have to be sorry, I promise you. Whatever last night was, you needed it, and I was more than happy to give it to you. Not … not happy about you having to deal with your dad's shit, but happy that I could be there to listen to you. Help you, even, if I managed to do that at all.'

'You did,' he said. 'I owe you thanks, too.'

'Well, I can accept that,' I said. 'But the apology's irrelevant.' I wanted to add that I'd had the best night's sleep, too, but something hot and uncomfortable choked the words back down. If I'd held my hand out in front of me, I was sure I'd be able to see it shaking, and I had to maintain some kind of composure.

Was he trying to deflect from something? Was he genuinely freaked out by how intense things had become between us?

We were standing by some old wooden fort-type thing, but the Nissan Stadium on the opposite bank offset the sense of historic Americana somehow. This site probably dated back to settlers, but I had no interest in tourism in that moment – I'd look it up later. I pulled my phone out with another purpose. Once I'd found our quiet, post-show location for the day, I'd spent a long time looking up reviews of the previous tour dates, and I'd saved the best ones. There were many. I wasn't surprised.

'Let's sit down,' I said. The quiet flow of the river, the chirping of cicadas and the night heat, still almost beyond my comprehension, made standing around feel like a lot of effort. I thought I might've made a mistake in asking, first, when Papa frowned at his clothes, but he seemed to overcome any concern over getting grass stains on his coat tails and we settled down together.

'I've been busy,' I said. I pulled up the note I'd created with my favourite quotes from reviews. 'I don't know if you read up on yourselves after shows, but listen to this: _they've raised the bar when it comes to live show performance._ This is from the literal first time I ever saw you. How about _it's fabulous and fun and definitely not to be taken too seriously …'_ I didn't miss the smile he tried to hide. ' _A sentiment that's clearly also shared by their adoring fans whose persistent screams of support throughout the show are deafening._ I can vouch for that. _Tonight's show proved that they are more than ready to move to the next level …_ '

I went on. And, slowly, I could feel him relaxing next to me. It wasn't his ego that needed to hear this – it was his insecurity. I wasn't inflating his head, I was enriching his soul. As cheesy as that sounded I knew it was true. By the time I'd finished it was a different, more fulfilled Papa I was sitting in the grass with.

'So you see,' I said, to wrap up, 'what the fuck does your dad know? You go out to play to these types of people, not him. And these people love you.'

'Well. They love the version of me that they see, but I understand your point. Thank you.'

Not for the first time, I thanked a God I didn't believe in for the privilege of knowing this version, the version I was now fairly sure was genuine. I watched him as he rested his elbows on his knees, gazing out towards the river. What had I said to Laura, the first time I'd seen his likeness on the t-shirts we were selling? About how he appeared to be a skeleton?

She'd been right, all those months ago. He was gorgeous. It had just taken me getting to know him for that to radiate from the inside out.

'Did you say Phil was on standby?' I said.

'Mm-hm.' He addressed the river.

'Do you think he would mind waiting for a bit? I'm quite happy out here. I could even fall asleep. That is, if you wouldn't mind that I'd be sleeping next to you again?'

Now, he turned to me, and his forehead was creased in irritation until he noticed I was trying not to giggle.

'Phil does what I tell him and he doesn't mind in the slightest,' he said. 'I'm not keen to repeat last night's shenanigans, though, if it is all the same to you.'

'Are you saying you didn't enjoy it?' I teased. The sick feeling you get when you take a risk was swirling about in my belly again, but we'd come this far. It was only the fact that the tops of his ears were turning red that gave away his embarrassment.

'It is not relevant how I felt about it. I'm your boss.'

'Bosses don't send their employees boxes of LPs and cheese. Nor do they end their messages with _xox._ They don't usually snuggle up in the sea together, either.'

At some point, as I spoke, I turned serious. I didn't want to tease him any more. I needed to know that Laura was right, that I wasn't imagining this … whatever it was between us. I needed to know whether or not there was a reason there was no one on Earth I would rather be getting bitten to hell by mosquitoes with than him.

'You aren't wrong,' he said. He leant back on his hands now, shoulders back, chest stretching out. Like we really were on holiday, enjoying the heat of the night while we were still on a post-ritual high and didn't have work to go to in the morning.

'So we're not just boss and employee, then?' I said. I could barely catch my breath now. In that moment, I couldn't think of anything more beautiful than the man before me and I couldn't believe I had the audacity to speak to him like this.

Thank God he didn't seem to mind.

'OK. We _are_ boss and employee but I'm happy that we're not _just_ boss and employee. How's that?' he said.

'Then you'll retract your apology for last night? And accept that I'm here for you, no matter what that means?'

He ruminated for a moment on that, and I simply watched him. I could've sworn his eyes filled up, and his breathing deepened. Finally, slowly, he turned his head alone so that we were maintaining a fierce eye contact that I knew meant he wanted me to really listen to him.

'I'm so glad you're here,' he said.

He was presenting me with the most perfect opportunity imaginable. I knew he wanted it as much as I did. Before I could doubt myself, or him, I leant in and kissed him.

I was right about him wanting it. He responded instantly, like he'd been waiting – I felt the soft touch of his left glove at my jaw as he pushed himself up with his right hand, angling his face into mine. His face paint was velvet smooth and not unpleasant against my lips, and though I knew it was probably smearing onto my skin too, the idea was a sudden turn-on. Everything he did, every movement he made, felt like a green light. I pulled him to me with both arms around him and he used that movement to push us onto the ground, me lying on my back with him between my legs. There could have been any manner of person wandering past us and I wouldn't have given one solitary shit right there, with our twirling tongues and roving hands. I couldn't get over how good the gloves felt. He kept one at my jaw as he moved down to kiss my neck and the barely-there touch made my entire face tingle.

'Am I covered in face paint?' I mumbled.

I felt him snort, ever so slightly, into my neck. 'Don't worry. It is hard-wearing, but you look ridiculously hot with a few smudges anyway.'

Something about being able to laugh with him even as his erection was beginning to make itself known to my inside thigh absolutely burned me from my groin outwards. There was heat from the air and heat from his body and heat from the inside of mine, and all of them together were too much. I wound my fingers into his hair, trying to hold him slightly more still for a breather. Not that I could find one. I was panting and I could feel both of our heartbeats beating a frantic samba against one another.

'Papa,' I gasped, but I couldn't find any more words than that. Kissing him was easier – it sort of said everything. I went about it gently, aware that I still had hold of his hair but pulling his face back so that we were eye-to-eye once more before going in again, no preamble, all presumption. The only thing stopping me from taking the other hand down to his now-full erection were the potential legal implications of the fact that I would be doing it in a public place.

He seemed to be thinking along the same lines. With apparent reluctance, he leant away from me, and we simply stared at one another for several seconds as we both found air again.

'Would it be unprofessional of me to suggest I summon Phil to take us both back to my hotel room?' he said.

'It would be pretty shitty of you to ask Phil to carry us both up there,' I said.

He rolled his eyes, suppressing laughter.

I understood the sentiment, of course. We waited by a large, obvious building on the other side of the road, his arm around my waist, my head on his shoulder, saying absolutely nothing to one another. I was glad of the break in proceedings – it made me certain that I wanted this and wasn't being driven by lust alone.

He even helped me into the back of the car as though we were leaving a film premiere. I found his hand again once we'd belted ourselves in. I sat in the middle, the narrow hump of a seat a small price to pay for being able to stay as close to him as possible. Papa's trust in Phil had been evident last night, and now, he didn't seem to consider him a bystander at all as he maintained his firm but tender grip on me. I noticed he crossed his right leg over his left, though.

I closed my eyes. The bright lights of music city faded in and out, illuminating my eyelids a scorching red then plunging me back into darkness over and over again, hypnotising me. I could smell him more intensely in the back of the car, rich and warm. I would have had no idea he'd just done a show in this same outfit if I hadn't known.

'Good night?' Phil said, to which Papa replied that it had been one of the best nights of his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was so so so so so satisfying to finally write!
> 
> And those reviews were all real:
> 
> https://metalwani.com/2017/03/gig-review-an-evening-with-ghost-live-at-theforum-london.html 
> 
> http://getreadytorock.me.uk/blog/2017/04/gig-review-ghost-abc-glasgow-29th-march-2017/ 
> 
> https://louderthanwar.com/ghost-university-great-hall-cardiff-live-review/


	19. In the Still of the Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie and Papa head back to the hotel in a dizzy state of arousal.
> 
> Life's not that straightforward, though. Not when the clergy are there to interfere.

It wasn't far to the hotel in the car, and part of me would have happily stayed in the back of it in our air conditioned cocoon, but within minutes we were walking into the hotel lobby and my beats per minute began to race again. Mere minutes more from the hotel room, and total privacy. Just me and my Papa.

The imminence reminded me of something.

'Would it be unprofessional of me to suggest I go to that CVS round the corner for some … protection?' I said, under my breath. Phil had wandered off to sit on one of the big chairs in the lobby, with a local newspaper, and though I didn't mind him knowing what Papa and I were up to, I didn't think he'd particularly _want_ to know.

'Ah! Good thinking. Don't be long …' He kissed me, then frowned as he drew away. 'Sorry. Let me just …'

I scrunched up my face in childish delight as he used his glove to wipe away what I assumed was a smudge of his face paint, now evident under the harsh hotel light. 'There. I'll be upstairs, don't worry. I need to speak to Phil about some things first anyway.'

'Oh, he _is_ good,' I said. I squeezed his hand. 'See you in five.'

I walked to the pharmacy and back in a sort of trance. It was still hot, too hot for me to able to function had I been in England, but dreamily so in Tennessee. I wondered if this _were_ a dream. If I was going to go to sleep (though I didn't want to think that far ahead just yet) and wake up in London with Laura, or worse, in an exam I hadn't actually finished yet. I wasn't just halfway across the world in physicality, I was in a whole other one in my head, too. A world I could never have imagined for myself, yet one that seemed like the perfect fit.

I'd felt like an idiot taking a bag for one tiny, light box of condoms, but I didn't much fancy carrying them around on display through the city. I felt them through the wrinkles of the bag, though. Very concrete and tangible, proof that they were needed. That this was my world, and that none of the chemistry between Papa and I had been in my imagination.

Then my way was blocked by a woman I'd never seen before – but who seemed to know me. I could literally see the hotel entrance from where I was, but she was standing square in front of me, and I knew he was doing it on purpose.

'Charlie?' she said. 'We haven't been introduced. I was unable to join the European tour, you see. I'm Sister Imperator.'

I didn't want to give away the fact that I had no idea who she was, but there must have been a tiny little frown of confusion, because her lips tightened. Some sort of Mother Superior type, maybe? She'd probably been mentioned, right?

'It's good to meet you, finally,' I said, hoping I sounded sincere. 'Papa has told me about you. I thought you mostly stayed at the Ministry.'

'I do. But some missions are too important to miss.' She smiled, sort of at the city around us. Perhaps she'd just really wanted a trip to the USA. 'Besides, it's a good thing I am out here. I need to speak to you before you see Papa Nihil's youngest again.'

_Before I saw him again?_ What did she know? Had she overheard something we'd said about Nihil? Not that it would have mattered. I didn't think Papa kept his feelings about his father secret …

'Erm – OK,' I said. 'Is everything all right?'

'Actually, I am concerned that it isn't,' she said, with a sigh. 'You see, I came down to the front desk a few minutes ago for some ice, and I overheard a conversation between Papa and his most trusted ghoul. They were talking about you.'

'Oh.' Without knowing what they'd been saying, what more could I say myself?

'Charlie, I don't want you to be fooled. That boy is a player. He always has been. He will admit that himself, if you ask him. And just because the game he has played with you has been long, it does not mean it is not still a game. Like father, like son, unfortunately.'

I still wasn't sure what I was supposed to say to that. I mean, in the first instance, she wasn't wrong. Papa had told me about his past, and I … didn't mind. But to suggest that I was the latest in a line of sauna-groupies?

She took my baffled silence as an invitation to continue. 'He and Phil were consorting in the lobby,' she said. 'I am sorry to be the bearer of this news, but I thought you ought to know in order to make an informed decision about where you stand with … that spoilt brat. He was telling Phil all about how hard he has been working to get you on-side, how he has spent so much money and manipulated you emotionally in order to make you finally fall for him. He's an idiot, yes, but a smart idiot. It is his way of getting around the party-boy image he held in the early days, as well as his way of getting staff to sleep with him. If he is seen with a steady partner his reputation is undamaged, but to him, you are not steady. You are dispensable. Do you understand, Charlie?'

The horrible thing was I knew she must have heard Papa and Phil in the lobby together. That was exactly where I'd left them.

And although I didn't know much about Sister Imperator, nobody had painted as poisonous a picture of her as they had of Nihil.

'Are you sure that's what he was saying?' I said, and Sister nodded gravely.

'Did you go to the beach after the Tampa ritual?' _Shit_. 'Yes … he was talking about how he broke down in front of you, and how it only made you want him more, because he had worked out that you were a kind, empathetic person and you valued peoples' ability to show their feelings. The most extreme feelings therefore equalled the most extreme attraction to him, no?'

Oh, God.

'As long as that man is wearing corpse paint, that man is performing,' Imperator said. 'You are not the only person he has done this to. This is the first time he has done it to such a new member of clergy _staff,_ though, which I suppose is a new low for him. And one so much younger than himself! I thought he might have changed and that he might truly have you on board for an innocent purpose, but alas, no. He is cunning but he is still driven only by his own selfish pleasures …'

That was enough. I had to hear this from the only man I was sure would tell me the truth.

The lobby was empty as I strode through it, thank goodness. I took the stairs, suspecting they'd be empty too, and I picked up the pace because my eyes were starting to burn and if I was half-jogging it stopped me from bursting into tears. The door to his room was closed, so I gave it a far more aggressive knock than was acceptable for this time of night.

He answered – the beautiful bastard – he answered holding a single red rose, and I think he might have been ready to say something seductive, only he saw the face I had on and faltered.

'Charlie? Is everything all right?'

'Why did you hire me?' I said.

He blinked. 'Wha – why did I hire you? You know why I hired you!'

'I thought I did,' I said. 'But thinking about it, it _is_ kind of weird how you'd employ a random student you found in London, make them feel like they belong with you, then fly them across the world without anyone else they know so you can get them into bed, isn't it?'

He let the hand with the rose fall to his side.

'What the hell are you trying to say?'

'I've just met dear Sister Imperator!' I hissed. 'And she overheard you talking to Phil about me. About how long it's taken to get me to fall for you …'

'Sister …? When? I've not seen her all night!'

I ignored him – he was trying to deflect and I had to stay on track because if I slipped I knew I would land slap-bang in the bed that was ready and waiting behind him.

'I was ignorant about how creepy that is but now you've gone and betrayed yourself, I can't pretend any more. How _dare_ you make me feel things for you? If you'd wanted to bang me in your fucking backstage sauna you should've said in Leeds or something!'

His ears, the only part of his face that wasn't covered in paint, were turning red. I could only assume the rest of his face was, too.

'I did not want to … to _bang_ you in my backstage sauna, or anywhere else, for that matter,' he said. 'That was never what this was about. _Never_.'

'Then explain tonight.'

He gestured wildly, with a harsh laugh. 'How do you explain nights like this?' he cried. He made a fist with his right hand and pounded his heart with it. 'How do you explain what goes on in here? I don't fucking know! It's just happened this way, that's all. And I thought you wanted it to happen this way. It certainly felt like that to me back at the river.'

'How do I know that didn't happen because you've slowly been manipulating me into wanting it to happen?'

'Because that's not what I was trying to do!' He sounded angry now, but he was making a real effort to contain it. Or maybe I'd just really upset him?

'OK – OK.' We were going to get nowhere, and get nowhere in a very public place, too. I had to get to the point. 'I don't want to spend all night fighting this out, Papa. Can you answer me two questions?'

'Of course.'

'Honestly?'

'What the hell else am I going to do?' He really was angry now, but I found I didn't care.

'OK. One – have you, or have you not, used your position to sleep with people in the past?'

I suspected I knew the answer to this one already. It didn't sting any less, though, when he nodded slowly. 'But not for a long time. I was drunk on power, I told you. I regret all of that and I don't do it any more, I take my position seriously.'

'Right.' I swallowed. His tone was convincing, but he'd admitted that it was possible, and that was what I had to concentrate on. 'And two – did you and Phil discuss how long it had taken me to fall in – fall for you? Just now?'

He actually rolled his eyes, which sent a white-hot jolt of rage through me. 'Well, yes … but –'

'No. No buts. That's what Sister Imperator said you'd said, so …'

'Actually, Charlie, there are quite a lot of 'buts' to this,' Papa said. 'For instance, what motivation would Sister have to upset you? She's never met you. Never mind the fact that I never saw her in the lobby.'

'I assume because you were too busy gloating over your long seduction process finally working?'

Because it had worked. Because, despite everything, most of me still wanted to kiss him again. To let him guide me into his room and do whatever the fucking hell he wanted to do to me. To never, ever return to do the last year of my degree and instead follow him all over the world.

But I wasn't a total idiot. I still had a sliver of rationality left in me.

Papa's whole body had slumped now. No longer poised, ready for a fight. He knew he was beat. So I knew I was right.

'I knew this was a bad idea,' he said, to the hotel carpet. 'I tried to get you to leave. Tonight. I had Phil ready to take you to the airport. You should have gone.'

'Maybe I still will.'

He inhaled again, and raised his eyebrows. 'Yes. OK. Go down to the lobby. I'll have Phil get your stuff and we will get you on the next plane to London.'

It was that, of all things, that finally made the tears spill over.

'Manchester,' I corrected him. 'That's my nearest major airport. I don't live in London any more. I dropped out of uni for –'

_For you._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I HATED THIS SO MUCH
> 
> Sorry


	20. It's Grim Up North

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back home, Charlie isn't sure what the hell life is all about any more.
> 
> A phone call from a certain someone's wholesome big brother might change that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back to work tomorrow so have a short update prior to the usual approximate scheduled update day!
> 
> (We're not here for this shit, anyway, are we? Let's face it ...)
> 
> I know some of you need or like to be warned about certain things so PLEASE keep an eye on the tags as I move forward. If that's not ominous af I don't know what is. Sorry :(

I didn't know what to do with myself for such a long time.

Aside from a tearful, hours-long phone call with Laura, I didn't give anyone the details of what had happened in Nashville. I couldn't have faced the inevitable backlash – in hindsight, I wasn't sure how I hadn't seen something like this coming. No doubt literally everyone else had seen it coming, too. But learning the hard way is, sometimes, the only way you ever learn.

I'd been in the US for less than forty-eight hours. There was still time to resume my degree, but Laura had made arrangements to live with some of her course mates, and I'd quit my job at the Forum. It was so unlikely I'd find somewhere affordable to live that I didn't even bother looking. I wouldn't have had the motivation to, anyway. In my head, I was taking time out to tour with Ghost. Even though that wasn't happening any more, that was what was still happening in my mind. I couldn't shake it.

So I couldn't do much else. There was simply no motivation in me to do anything at all.

I told my parents I was spending all day applying for jobs, and when the interviews weren't rolling in, they tutted and sighed sadly at the state of the job market, or the fact that employers probably suspected I'd be going back to uni at some point. Of course, they never knew that I maybe managed one application a week, between the dozing, snack consumption, and watching the most pointless YouTube videos I could find. Anything that required minimum effort, and that sucked up any focus I might have spent elsewhere on things I didn't want to focus on.

Much like the first time we'd parted, Papa never tried to get in touch with me. Infuriatingly, I had to admit a grudging respect for him for that. I had left never wanting to see him again, or at least giving him that impression, and if he'd pushed for my attention I'd have been even more sickened than I already was. He might have strung me along for months on end, but once called out, he had the basic decency to at least stop.

I knew he was at Bloodstock. When the festival was happening, some two hours away from my house, I marked the occasion by listening to all of the records Papa had given me while simultaneously trying to detach the idea of him from them. It was easier with the earlier music, knowing it hadn't been him who'd recorded these songs – but some of them, I'd heard him sing. I had my moments of being able to enjoy the music for what it was but, overwhelmingly, all of it represented him. I don't know if I felt better or worse after that night.

It wasn't long after that, though, that Laura called me with strange news.

'Charlie,' she said, without so much as a 'hey'. She sounded breathless. 'Papa Two's turned up at my house.'

It was such an improbable statement that I assumed, without question, that she was kidding. There was a sick feeling in my belly even entertaining the idea. How could she be so cruel as to drag all that up? Especially after so much time. We'd not talked about any of it in weeks – for all she knew, I could have been over my tryst. I could have been in the best place, mentally, of my life until that moment.

'No, he hasn't,' I said. She'd have seen me rolling my eyes if she'd been standing in front of me – it was a good thing we were so far apart.

'Don't be awkward,' she said, and she wasn't teasing. There was a desperate, pleading note in her voice that made me swallow hard and clutch my phone that bit more tightly. 'I could put him on, right now. In fact I think he wants me to. Do you want to speak to him?'

She's not joking. She's not messing with my feelings. And my heart wants to burst when I realise that, if I say I really don't want to talk to Secundo, she won't make me.

'Erm …' I have to pause for a moment to gather myself, but it doesn't do much good. This is a _lot._ 'What the hell? How has he even found you?'

'The clergy had our old address so he turned up there and asked where the old occupants had gone,' Laura said. She's laughing, but I can tell she's also quite impressed. And frightened. 'I left my address with them in case they needed to forward anything on that I'd forgotten to change myself.'

I shook my head. 'They're … they're so creepy,' I said. 'If anyone else did that, I would be calling the police. Has he said why he's here?'

I had a pretty good guess, obviously, but I wanted to hear something tangible.

'He wants me to assure you that Terzo … is that how you say it?' I heard Secundo say something in the background, and Laura chuckled. 'OK, Three doesn't know he's here or anything. He hasn't orchestrated this. If that makes you any more likely to speak to him.'

It did. 'Put him on. Thank you.'

What reason could he have to come all the way to the UK, when Ghost were supposed to be in Sweden finishing the tour, to find me? We hardly knew each other. If he was being honest about not being here on his brother's orders, I couldn't think of a single reason he'd waste so much time and effort.

My beats per minute were going a bit crazy as I waited for him to take Laura's phone with absolutely no idea what he was going to say to me.

'Charlie? Are you there?' The husky, Italian accent sent me straight to the musky backstage corridors of some venue on the UK tour, meeting people for the first time and wondering what the hell I was doing amongst them. I took a deep breath, savouring the feeling of belonging, as I knew it was going to last approximately two seconds. 'It is me. Secundo. Are you able to talk?'

I was in my room, on my own. Of course. It was the middle of the day so everyone I knew had something important to be doing. 'Yes … is everything OK?'

I didn't want to ask about him. Even though we both knew it was hanging between us, I wasn't going to acknowledge it. I'd come this far.

'To be honest with you, no,' said Secundo. 'That is why I've come out here. If you don't object, I would really like you to meet me in London.'

'When?'

'Today. Your kind friend here told me where you live. About an hour from now, a train leaves from your nearest station that will get you to Kings Cross just in time for dinner. I have paid for a ticket, all you need to do is collect it from the station. I'll give you a secret word to tell the attendant – they are expecting you. If you choose to do this, I will meet you at Kings Cross and explain everything there.'

'Wait – no. You'll explain everything now if you're expecting me to get to London _today._ Why do I need to go all that way to speak to you?' The more he spoke, the more I suspected this did indeed have something to do with his brother.

I heard a sigh. 'All right. I have some information that I think will persuade you to get on a plane to Sweden with me tonight.'


	21. Kings Cross

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Papa II, concerned that his baby brother hasn't been himself of late, has done some digging.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've ever been to Kings Cross Station, and had your platform simply not appear for ages, and had to wait with a Costa on that balcony bit watching the departure boards? This chapter's for you
> 
> It's also for anyone who's ever line danced in Nashville TN

He wasn't easy to miss. Even in a station full of City types, his suit and stance stood out a mile as he waited near the Pret with a paper cup in each hand. I was sure I didn't stand out enough for him to notice me. Ducking between people rushing from each side of the concourse, I strode straight towards him, and indeed he didn't register my presence until we were mere metres apart.

'Ah! _Ciao_ , Charlie. Laura told me you enjoy Pret a Manger's flat whites?' He held his right hand out to me, and I took the cup off him with a surprised smile. 'Although I daresay, one of these days, we'll get you to Italy so you can try the best cappuccinos in the world.'

'Thank you,' I said. Coffee was the perfect greeting at the end of a long train journey, but I allowed myself just a small sip for now – there was too much to talk about. 'This was really nice of you. I must admit, it _is_ good to see you, Papa.'

He nodded sagely. 'I'm glad to hear that. I knew there was a chance you would refuse to even speak to me, so I must thank you for your trust. I do indeed have much to say to you that might change your mind about some … things.'

It hit me, then, that I had no idea what Papa knew. It also hit me that he was missing a ritual in Sweden by being here. Suddenly, I knew I had to take whatever he said very seriously.

'Let's sit down somewhere,' I said, and I led him upstairs, where we were lucky enough to find a free table that wasn't covered in Costa detritus.

'I will cut to the chase,' Papa said. 'My plane leaves at five past seven and I would really like you to be on it with me.'

I looked at the clock above the departure boards. 'You haven't got much time, then?'

'I certainly haven't, so you need to listen to me.'

He'd been airy and pleasant enough so far, but there was a noticeable shift in his demeanour now. He set his coffee down on the table and leant forward, making sure he was facing me with his entire body. I found myself resisting the urge to shrink back slightly. These Emeritus brothers were very intense men, both on-stage and off.

'Terzo did not tell me why you left,' he said. I almost flinched - whether with pleasure or anxiety, I wasn't sure - at the name. 'When I noticed you were not around any more, I asked the question of him innocently, and he only said that you'd decided this life wasn't for you after all and Phil had taken you home. And, perhaps, that would have been the end of it – if he hadn't spent the rest of the tour moping and avoiding us as much as possible. I'm ashamed to say it took a very long time for me to make the connection, but I finally did just the other day. I got a chance to speak to him as we began preparations for tonight's Gröna Lund ritual and I asked, outright, what had happened with you. Again he simply said you had changed your mind about the touring life and wanted to go back to university. But I knew there had to be more to it than that. He finds it very difficult to hide how he feels about things, you see. Ordinarily he has no problem ranting to me about the usual frustrations he faces in our line of work. Namely our dear father, of course. To be withholding something, even though it was so plain that there was something to withhold, meant _he'd_ done something. So I sought out his favourite ghoul.'

'Phil …'

' _S_ _ì_. I asked Phil outright if he knew what had happened, and as it turned out Papa had shared a few details with him when you left. Phil had some trivial involvement, I believe?' He trained his eyes on me that bit more intensely, and I nodded, willing him to carry on. 'Yes. Phil simply said that Terzo had been confused, but that Sister Imperator had overheard them having a conversation about you in the lobby of the hotel we were staying at after the Nashville ritual. And she found you and related it back to you, except that she seemed to skew the details somewhat.'

We were getting somewhere. I leant into him almost instinctively.

'The whole thing just … did not sit right with me. And then I remembered. Immediately after the Nashville ritual, Sister and I went line dancing at the Wildhorse Saloon. I stayed out for hours but Sister left when she received an urgent call from Nihil, and between us Phil and I worked out that she would not have been in the hotel lobby at the same time as he and Terzo. When she found you on your way back from CVS I doubt she would even have been in the hotel since before the ritual. So when I smelled a rat, I of course went straight to that _bastardo_ Nihil.'

'And did he have much to say for himself?'

Secundo smirked, and took a satisfying sip of coffee – this, I knew, meant we'd come to the climax. 'He may be my father, but he is a weak old man and I can be very persuasive if the situation demands it. _Nihil_ had overheard a snippet of the conversation, and wilfully ignored its true meaning. He then relayed the meaning _he_ chose to interpret to Sister, over the phone, and implored her to tell you about it. He knew you would be suspicious if he were the one to dissuade you from getting involved with Terzo –'

'Bloody right I would've been!'

'Well, quite. So he tricked Sister, and she thought she was doing the right thing, but in all fairness I am furious at her too. She knows what my father is like and I am surprised she didn't suspect his manipulation, Satan knows she has been on the receiving end of it in the past.' He rolled his eyes, shaking his head along with them, before he took another, more gratuitous mouthful of coffee. 'So … from what I have pieced together … our father made Sister feed you presumptions about Terzo's intentions in the hope that you would leave him. When in fact Terzo has … well. I will let him tell you that, if you agree to see him again. But I can assure you, Charlie, that he has not been himself since you've been gone. He is not over you leaving. You were not just some unusually hard-earned fling to him, and you need to trust me on that.'

I tried to reply, but my throat was constricted: I drank from my own cup until it eased off and I could use my voice at its normal pitch. 'So Sister lied to me?'

I needed to make sure I'd understood this properly, because part of me still couldn't believe that these last months of heartache might all have been for nothing.

'I don't know for sure exactly what she said to you, but in essence – yes.'

I nodded slowly. I couldn't do much else but pick up my coffee again. I almost drained it in an attempt to gather my thoughts. It wasn't enough to completely compose me this time. I looked away from Secundo, across the station towards the departure boards. The orange-lit station names blurred the more I tried to focus on them. There was one, leaving in about ten minutes, that would take me home if I wanted to turn around and pretend this hadn't happened. When I really considered it, took everything into account, this group of bizarre Satan priests had caused me more than enough heartache already. There was no guarantee of a happy ending for life if I flew to Sweden right now. Maybe, if my thought process was in the real world, all I needed to do was put this behind me.

There was also, though, no guarantee of a happy ending for life if I went home.

I brushed away tears before they had a chance to spill onto my cheeks. I was pretty sure Secundo noticed, but I was also past caring.

'Papa,' I said. 'I'm coming to Sweden.'

*

I was grateful that he let me be quiet on the plane to Stockholm. He also let me have the window seat, too, an extra kindness that afforded me the luxury of staring out at the clouds as the vastness around me turned from blue to orange to black.

It was as though every bad feeling, every thought and every bit of self-doubt since Nashville had been swiped from my mind, as though they were merely chalk scribbles on a blackboard waiting for an eraser to sweep across them and prepare the surface for a new day and a new story. It didn't feel like my pain had been a waste of time, just that it was irrelevant, now. I was on my way to rectify it.

We had a layover in Munich, a stop spent mostly on plastic airport seats. Secundo disappeared to the shops on his own so I could sit with our bags, and returned with armfuls of snacks. I dunno how he knew I liked Ritter but he didn't complain when I ate three full bars on my own. Espresso, Hazlenut and Praline.

Much like some of those walks with his brother, the quiet between us was a safe one. Comfortable. We both knew that any conversation we had would be pure speculation and do nothing to help me with the confrontation I was heading towards, so we didn't bother much. Now and again he would make a witty observation to make me chuckle, or even just ask me how I was. Whenever he did, I would just nod. There wasn't a word for this feeling. Being hours away from confirming everything you'd ever dared to dream.

I slept on the flight to Stockholm. We arrived at about ten to nine in the morning so I was glad of a bit of a snooze, but gladder still to find out we still had a four-and-a-half hour drive to Gothenburg. My head was still in a fuzz as we made our way out through security and I knew I wouldn't be able to hold down a serious conversation if it remained in this state.

I brightened, though, at the sight of Phil waiting by a Saab. He was holding a sign that read CHARLIE in capital letters that looked hastily scribbled as the result of a last-minute brainwave, and my face broke into a smile. I squashed the sign between us as I launched myself on him in a tight embrace.

'Phil,' I gasped. 'I'm so happy to see you. I need to erase the last memory you have of me crying in the back of your car …'

'Hey, Charlie,' he said. 'If it makes you feel better, when I think of you I have much nicer memories that come up first?'

I drew away from him with a nod and a bit of a lump in my throat. 'Well, I'm back to make more. Cancel that last one, it didn't mean anything.'

Secundo lowered his voice to speak to Phil as the two of them started to load our cases into the boot, but I heard every word all the same. 'What's Nihil said? Has he noticed?'

Phil shook his head only slightly. 'The line is that you passed out from an Absolut binge before Grona Lund and travelled to Gothenburg separately because you couldn't stop puking. So let's at least keep one part of that true and get you to Gothenburg.'

I slid into the car as the door of the boot slammed. Then:

'And how is Terzo?'

There was a silence hanging between them for several seconds before Phil was able to answer that one.

'I had to dissuade him from bringing your door down last night after the ritual. He was in some distress and he wanted to talk to you, but I assured him that the last thing coming out of your mouth would be words and he backed down eventually. He's … not great, Papa. I don't think he's facing tonight with much optimism.'

'Because he hasn't had Charlie to help him with that,' Secundo said sadly.

I let my head roll back against the headrest when they got into the front of the car, feigning enough of a doze that they might be confident I hadn't heard a word they'd said while simultaneously trying not to burst into tears.

Phil had brought breakfast in the form of pastries and fruit and while I was desperate for food that wasn't an airport snack, I was even more desperate to have my thoughts to myself for a while. Tonight was the last ritual of the tour, and of Papa's tour cycle. That was undoubtedly why Secundo had sought me out with so much urgency. There was a risk this might be the end of his brother's involvement with Ghost, at least on the musical level. I thought back to our walk along the Clyde, when we'd passed the arena, and how he'd hesitantly told me that things seemed to be going well. He'd never thought to tell me, but they'd won a _Grammy_. So much for his arrogance: I'd had to look that one up myself. Things were going about as well as they could be for a church masquerading as a rock band. That had to be enough, surely? That had to be a sign that Papa was the man for the job and that his momentum was only going to carry Ghost forward with more speed and success?

There was no younger brother, either. No one to pass the torch onto, so to speak.

Maybe he was only worried because I'd done so much more for his self-esteem than anyone else could have. Maybe that was why I was racing towards Gothenburg in the back of a Saab. Once we got our fight ironed out I could tell him, all over again, that he had nothing to worry about. I could tell him there was no one on Earth who could do as good of a job as he was doing. And I could tell him to make this last show count.

'Oh, shit …' Phil sighed.

I jerked out of my tearful reverie just in time to feel the engine's rumble shift underneath me: I rubbed my eyes and leant to the middle of the car to see a snake of brake lights up ahead. We slowed down to meet the car in front of us, and Phil pulled the handbrake.

We didn't have to speak the implications aloud.

'How long does it take to get to Gothenburg from Stockholm?' I asked. I tried to make it sound like I was simply curious about the geography of Sweden. Phil's tone mimicked mine when he answered.

'It was about four and a half hours when I looked up the route,' he said.

I counted in my head. We'd left the airport at around quarter past nine. That would've got us there at quarter to two, with plenty of time for me to freshen up and get my head on straight before finding Papa before the ritual. Hopefully, this traffic wasn't going to push us back too far.

After half an hour of sitting in it, with all of us pretending like none of us were bothered, Phil's phone rang.

It seemed weird that a ghoul would have a phone, somehow, but if any of them were going to it was going to be Phil. It didn't surprise me that it was a Nokia brick. He peered into the distance for a moment, presumably to check whether he was in danger of the traffic moving off again, before glancing down at it.

'It's Nihil,' he said. 'Be quiet, all right?'

Papa and I nodded, and Phil answered his phone.

'Hello, Papa Nihil!' It could almost have been a different Phil speaking. 'How are you this afternoon? Oh – I'm tending to Secundo. Yes, he's still in a state. You should've seen how many bottles we found in his …' He broke off, and I saw him frown in the rear view mirror. 'No, I didn't say I was in his room, I said I was tending to him. He desperately needs rehydration salts so I've gone out for some. He has lost very large amounts of fluid over the last day, from both ends … trust me, you don't want to go anywhere near his hotel room. I'm going to have to pay off the hotel staff when we leave …' He forced a nervous chuckle, which would've been endearing had I not been holding my breath wondering what the hell kind of demands Nihil was making of him. 'I'm on my way back, Papa, don't worry. I'll be there in time for the ritual. I look forward to it.'

When he'd tucked his phone into his (extraordinarily tight) jeans with a sigh, I dared to pose the question.

'We … we will get there in time for the ritual, won't we?'

Phil forewent the rear view mirror in favour of swivelling all the way around in his seat.

'Absolutely,' he said. 'You have nothing to worry about.'


	22. Välkommen till en legendarisk sommar!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After no contact for months, Charlie finally arrives i Sverige to explain to Papa what they've since learned about Nihil's scheming. But is Papa willing to forgive after so much heartache?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NaNo is taking precedence in my life at the moment, I'm afraid! But I'm just about keeping up with my other stuff on here (although WJHTFITT is in danger of falling behind ... just bear with me!) Thank you all for such lovely comments thus far.
> 
> Again - please please please keep an eye on my tags - this story follows the Ghost canon in one quite major respect?

We marched into Stora Scenen in Liseberg much, much later than I would've liked, but with a couple of hours to spare before Miserere Mei, Deus, at least. No one batted an eyelid at Phil or Secundo, and I stayed as small as I could between the two of them as they led me to the room they knew to be Papa's. Indeed, his name was on there, as usual. Secundo hammered at it continuously as he yelled.

'Terzo! I have someone here who would like to wish you luck for the ritual. Make yourself decent and open the door, you have five seconds before I open it myself.'

I actually counted in my head. So, apparently, did he, because when I got down to zero he pushed the door open.

The room was empty. My eyes flicked from corner to corner, wondering if he was there pre-corpse paint and I simply hadn't registered him, but my eyes wouldn't conjure him into being. He really wasn't there.

Secundo turned to Phil. 'Which hotel are we staying at tonight?'

But Phil was shaking his head.

'The meet and greet,' he said. 'It'll be happening right now. He'll come back before the show, but he's busy with fans at the moment.'

Fans. _Fucking_ fans. Ironic, really. The whole reason I was even here, flushed and stressed and on the verge of tears that I was praying silently would wait until I was alone in the shower later tonight, was because he'd enlisted my help in getting him away from some of the bad ones. Would it be the worst thing in the world if I did the same thing tonight?

I repressed it. Of course it would. If I tried to imagine it, meeting Papa as a fan had to be an experience on another plane of existence.

'I could go and alert him …?' Phil said, but I shook my head.

'It would just stress him out. I'll wait here for him,' I said. 'That way I'll have the most possible time to hear his side of the story before he goes on-stage. I can't interrupt his meet and greet.'

The pair of them gave one another resigned nods.

'Are you OK, Charlie?' Phil said. Even just his voice was reassuring. He could've said the foulest things and made them sound as though he were taking me out for ice cream.

'I think so,' I said. 'I already – sort of know what happened, after all. I just need to get the ins and outs and grovel my arse off. I've caused him enough misery already, the least I can do for him is make sure he's happy for the last ritual of the cycle, isn't it?'

Secundo, somewhat awkwardly, patted me on the arm.

'Thank you for trusting me,' he said. 'My brother … he's never had anyone like you. Someone so good.'

I could only offer him a smile as I moved to sit down in front of Papa's dressing table, and Phil and Secundo shut me in.

If you've never seen a dressing room, I hate to disappoint you in informing you that they're actually pretty boring, for the most part. Until someone like Papa Emeritus the Third rolls into one.

It was a while before he did roll into this one, though. I had too much time to think – somehow, the whole journey over had been enough to occupy my body so that nervousness didn't kick in, but here, with nothing to do but sit … my insides turned to fluid. There was a dull ache in my head that I couldn't explain, and the wrong smell or motion might have made me throw up. With no idea when the meet and greet was supposed to finish, I had no idea when Papa was going to walk through that door, but no matter when it was I wasn't sure I would ever be ready.

He didn't know I was here. What would he have to say to me? I'd never have the words to say anything meaningful back. All I'd done was mistrust him, unduly. I'd taken the word of a stranger as read and hadn't given him a real chance to explain himself. Secundo's intentions may have been honourable, but his brother may well have been down because he was just so angry at the way I'd treated him. This evening might end in a fight, not a reconciliation, and it was only now that the confrontation was imminent that I was even considering that possibility.

But when the door opened, and in he came in his full regalia, with the tiniest relieved sigh before he clocked me sitting in front of his dressing table …

'Oh.'

Maybe I would have said the exact same thing in his position.

'Hi,' I said. The word felt so small in the room between us and I wanted to take it back as soon as it was out there. I should've opened with something else. Anything else.

'Charlie,' he said. I couldn't fathom out what was going on in his head from his expression or his tone. He raised his hands to take his mitre off and put it on the dressing table. He always seemed to lose height when he wasn't wearing it, but tonight he didn't lose anything else – I wasn't used to him in the full vestments. I didn't feel worthy of being in his presence when he was dressed this way, as though he really did transcend Earthly realms and he had to bestow his permission on me to simply exist near him. That permission had certainly not been granted today.

I stood up. I felt like I had to. I almost felt like I should drop to my knees.

'What are you doing here?' He said slowly. 'How did you get here?'

'I don't know where to start,' I said.

I knew I'd surprised him, and I owed him an explanation for the logistics. But there were far more important things that needed explaining first.

'You have your brother to thank for me being here,' I said. 'Unless you don't want me here. In which case he won't be far away, and you can go and punch him, if you want …'

I was attempting to lighten the mood, but it wasn't the sort of mood that needed lightening, and I realised that when he frowned at me.

'I won't be punching my brother,' he said stiffly. 'I just … you must understand that seeing you here … was not what I was expecting tonight.'

'It's the last ritual of the tour,' I said stupidly. He nodded.

'So you must have a serious reason for interrupting my preparations.'

He was the one who'd been put out here, yet my eyes were the ones filling with tears. I could hardly bear the lack of expression. I hated not knowing how he was feeling, almost as much as I hated knowing he was upset.

'I made a mistake,' I said, and against my will my voice cracked. 'And it's taken me far too long to realise it and I'm … so, so sorry.'

I wanted to sound strong. Confident in my convictions. I wanted to sound like the sort of person who was committed to changing their behaviour, not the sort of person who grovelled out of self-pity – and I was sure that was how I must have sounded. Here for his forgiveness so I could feel better about myself, instead of wanting to make him feel better. And that was all I wanted.

I wiped my eyes, determined to compose myself so whatever conversation we had could be rational and reasoned, and I watched him. I watched him watching me, his face softening. I sniffed heavily a few times and he shook his head.

'What made you realise?'

'Your darling brother,' I said, and his lips twitched upwards. 'But … it shouldn't have taken that. I should've trusted you. I _do_ trust you. I …' Shit. I knew how I wanted to finish that sentence but I also knew he wasn't in the headspace to hear it. My throat closed up again and I gave another wet, heavy sniff.

'Oh, _per l'amor del cielo_ …' He sighed, and he strode forward to gather me up in his arms, pulling me close to him so that my face was pushed into his shoulder and I was sobbing uncontrollably into his chasuble. He had to wear it on-stage soon and here I was covering it in a foul mess of bodily fluids. That knowledge wasn't enough to stop me.

'Your dad got Sister Imperator to lie to me.' It came as a gasp – I was struggling to catch my breath. I hiccupped a couple of times before I could continue, and I felt him stroke my back. 'And I never let you explain yourself properly. I just believed her.'

'You had no reason to think you'd been told lies,' he murmured. I marvelled at his calm, however much effort it must have been to maintain.

'But you _tried_. I just wouldn't listen. And I'm … I can't get across how sorry I am. I never will be able to. We could've had all this time …'

He kissed the top of my head. 'Charlie, I forgive you. I think you need to hear that. But if this is my dad's doing, then you don't have to feel anywhere near as bad as you must feel right now. I'll deal with the bastard once tonight is over, don't you worry …'

I didn't deserve him.

We clung onto one another as I cried myself into a barely-functioning sort of stupor, pulling away from him with a dull pain behind my eyes. I left my arms at his shoulders as I gazed at him.

'Tell me your side,' I said. 'I should've let you tell me a long time ago.'

So he did. We stood there, loosely entwined, faces inches apart, as he explained how he and Phil had been in the Nashville hotel lobby talking about whether they would be able to cover his bed in flower petals before I got back from CVS. How he'd barely been able to believe someone like me could fall for him. How I'd seen him at his absolute worst at Pier 60 and I didn't seem to have minded. How he'd never imagined he could fall so wholly and completely for somebody because he rarely considered sex and emotions in tandem. How he'd realised that only wanting to bestow pleasure above wanting to receive it meant feelings on a deeper level than he'd ever experienced before. And I could hear the nuggets of truth that Nihil had twisted into his own version of the conversation, and I could work out how the answers that Papa had given me at the hotel room door were both true and totally misleading at the same time.

'Charlie, when I hired you, that was all I was doing. Seducing you wasn't my intention. I'd expected to work with you, then say goodbye at the end of the tour … tonight, I mean. All I saw in you back then was a calming influence. Not … not this. Not whatever it is you've become to me now. You've got to believe me.'

'I do,' I said. 'I think I always did. I just wish …'

'I know. I know.'

He pushed his forehead against mine, and I closed my eyes. Just to breathe, to let his breath mingle with mine. To count my lucky stars that I hadn't, totally at least, fucked this up.


	23. I'm With the Band

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The culmination of months of sexual tension.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaah
> 
> I wanted to write this chapter 'properly', if you know what I'm saying. But due to the nature of how I've written Charlie, and the response I've had to them, I really didn't want to prescribe any parts to them, so ... here's a glossed over, would-be piece of smut that I hope you nevertheless enjoy.
> 
> What I semi-plan on doing is writing a separate little fic in which this scene happens in full with two sets of genitalia. I just feel like I've short changed people not going into detail, so that could be a solution. I did this here https://archiveofourown.org/works/27300628/chapters/66701830 with Mary and his partner, anyway

I took several deep breaths.

'Where does that leave us, then?' I said.

He didn't respond with words. He just closed the gap between us to kiss me, and even more than the plane journey over, it wiped away the months of anguish. As though nothing had happened between the brief kiss in the lobby of our hotel in Nashville and this one, I melted into it without hesitation. That heady combination of unspent emotion and guaranteed privacy fuelled us both tonight. He parted my lips and ran his tongue along the bottom one before slipping it into my mouth to meet mine with urgency. Both hands made their way down my back to my waist so he could pull my pelvis forward, right against his, and I instinctively started to grind my hips into him, keeping up the same rhythm as our kiss. Heat from my groin burned outwards until I was flushed all over, my movements controlled not by me, but by my desire. This was the night we should have had in Nashville.

Except tonight, there was time pressure, and … there was nothing happening to him.

I'd stopped being shy with our bodies as soon as our lips had touched, and unlike the night on the banks of the Cumberland River, I wasn't feeling any sort of reaction from him. I whimpered into his mouth when I realised, speeding up my desperate rutting in the hope that it would elicit something – it wasn't my pleasure that I cared about any more, but his, and he must have sensed my discomfort because he broke away from me and steadied his grip on my waist to hold me still.

'Are you OK?' I whispered, and he bit his lip, avoiding my eyes.

'I do want this,' he said. 'I promise. I just … my body is too concerned with what's going to happen afterwards to concentrate on what is happening right now, I fear.'

Of course. The ritual – the one he was worried might be his last, if Nihil really was displeased with how he'd handled his stint as the face of Ghost.

I leant in for a string of soft, gentle kisses. 'And that's perfectly understandable,' I said. 'It's a big night for you, my darling. Don't forget why you hired me in the first place … I'm here for you, whatever that means. Whatever you need from me.'

'But you don't work for me any more,' Papa breathed. 'You are simply here with me.'

I wasn't sure why that sent pulses of desire all the way through me. 'I'm still here for you.'

I slid one hand down the front of his chasuble, all the way down to his cock, searching clumsily through the layers of silky fabric. There was a moan in his throat but he was as soft as ever, even as I attempted to massage him.

'I'm sorry …' he mumbled, and I withdrew my hand.

'No, don't you dare apologise. We have all the time in the world for this after the ritual if we can't do it now. Hell, even if we _can_ do it now.'

But I couldn't soothe his anxiety – I knew this. We'd been in this situation before, after all, and sometimes my being there was the best thing I could do for him.

'It doesn't have to be all about me,' he said, running a hand through his hair. 'I don't need an erection to give you an orgasm, Charlie …'

'Well, I'm not having one if you're not.'

Giving him a smile, I took hold of his hand and led him over to the small sofa away from the dressing room door. It wasn't the most erotic or inspiring location in the world, but with him there, it was my wildest fantasy. He dazzled in any setting, even dull, musty ones like this one. We sat together, my fingers entwined with his in their leather gloves, my head on his shoulder.

'How are you feeling?' I said. 'Tell me. Honestly.'

I rose and sank with his deep breaths. 'I don't know. Too many things all at the same time. I think that is the problem.'

I glanced at my watch, hoping he wasn't paying my wrist much attention: we really didn't have the time to break everything down in conversation, much to my despair. If it weren't for the music, muffled but piping from the other side of the wall, I'd have sat there all night if it had taken all night. At least this time we'd stay dry.

'That's understandable,' I said. 'It's a shame we can't go for a walk, isn't it? Maybe we could've hashed it all out.'

He gave me a sad smile. 'It is a shame, now you mention it. It would have been quite something to wander among the rides after dark. Perhaps we do that afterwards.'

'Oh, no. We won't have time afterwards, either,' I said, very seriously. He turned his head just a fraction, and I turned mine to match him. 'No … I have plans for afterwards.'

He waited for me to elaborate, but I left him hanging. Teasing, waiting for him to ask. He succumbed with another smile. 'What sort of plans?'

'Well …' I gave his hand a squeeze, then raised it to my lips to kiss it. 'After the ritual, we're going to tell your father where to go, and then I'm going to find Phil. He's going to drive us up north to a log cabin with a hot tub and a sauna, where you can rest and bask in a job well done, because you've done the _best_ job, Papa. And we're going to ignore the outside world for days and drink red wine and make love on a fur rug in front of a roaring fire because who the fuck cares about your fucking _dad_?'

'Hmm. Talking about making love and my father in the same breath …?'

I shrugged, smirking to myself. 'I didn't think that one through. But the point still stands. Phil would take us, you know he would.'

He said nothing more, either, but the silence between us was warm. I thought I heard a few muffled swallows in his throat, the sort you do to stop yourself from sobbing, and squeezed his hand again. This time, he gripped me back firmly.

'You don't have to be here.' His voice was steady, if slightly higher in pitch than usual. 'I'm not paying you any more.'

'Well – no, you aren't,' I said. 'And yet somehow, I'm still here.'

He stroked the back of my hand with his thumb. 'Why is that, then?'

I shrugged, trying to make it look casual again. 'I guess I've sacked off uni. I guess I've realised I don't really want to be there any more.'

I felt him chuckle, but his voice was still breaking. 'Charlie. Please.'

It was time to stop winding him up now. I knew where the line was.

'Because I want to be with you.'

It was just about all the heavy emotion either of us could take. Before we could crumble under its weight, before it took away the strength that Papa so badly needed for the ritual ahead, we closed the small gap between us in another kiss.

We'd kissed before. Several times. But this might as well have been our first, it was so fraught with unsaid words. Slow, fluid, despite the tightness in my neck and shoulders as I twisted them upwards. It wasn't a comfortable position. I broke away from him, punctuating my movements with small kisses, and turned my entire body around, swinging my left knee over his lap and sliding both arms right around him until our lips could fully meet again. He pulled me into him, our chests pushed together, and I shuffled forwards. There was no space between us any more. I rocked my hips into his, and he pushed his up to meet mine.

And as I moved with him, I felt his growing erection underneath me.

He tried to keep his cool, but the delight in his eyes was unmistakeable when he pulled away from me just slightly.

'Just … don't do anything yet,' he whispered. 'Just keep doing this. Exactly as we are.'

I obliged, swooping immediately back down to cover his mouth with mine again. It wasn't a challenge. I loved the feeling of surrounding him, of having the two of us so closely entwined in emotional intimacy even without the prospect of taking it to another level. But his hands, still in their leather gloves, were at the small of my back, exerting small amounts of pressure so that we were still moving in rhythm. He really did want this. If we had time, this was going to happen.

My head was fuzzy with the overwhelming reality of the whole thing.

'Are you OK?' I sighed, against his lips.

' _Mmmm._ '

I rolled my hips again, this time holding him still so I could gyrate in place and send hot, electric pulses from my groin outwards. He hadn't been expecting the change of pace, and he let out a strangled moan. I felt his dick twich against me.

'You like that …' I ground my hips further down, exerting firmer pressure. 'Don't you?'

'Mm. You're breathless. You can't pretend you aren't doing it for yourself, too.'

My own pleasure, truly, only felt like a bonus if I was pleasing him. I reached a hand down, fumbling through the side of his chasuble for a better hold on him. I wanted to feel his hardness, to understand the effect I was having on him, and when I got to the trousers he was wearing underneath I found them sticky already.

'No problems now, Papa?' I teased. I traced my hand all around his crotch before taking hold of his cock and squeezing, and he leant back with a throaty grunt.

'Charlie … _cazzo_ … we don't have much time …'

I withdrew my hand to draw a line down his nose with the trace of his own precum, enjoying the way it smeared his face paint. He couldn't go onstage like that – or perhaps he ought to? Then everyone would know, finally, that he was _mine._ The image seared through me. It wouldn't take much for me to reach my climax from here, I knew it. We didn't have much time? We didn't _need_ much time.

I could just about hear the opening vocalisations of Miserere Mei, Deus. I found myself wishing, for the first time, that I understood the Latin they were singing.

I leant down, kissed him hard.

'Then we'd better do something about that,' I said.

Together, we lifted the chasuble up over his head, and I unfastened his trousers. The sight of his full, leaking erection took me by surprise: he wasn't wearing underwear. I, unfortunately, was, under the comfy jeans I'd flown over in. It was awkward, faffing on together to get my layers out of the way, but we got there in the end. And to the sound of Latin choral music, and only slightly concerned that another member of the clergy would burst into the room in a panic, we made love on the small sofa in the dressing room.

I wasn't thinking about it at the time, but I knew afterwards that I would have to fill Laura in. When I'd first laid eyes on Papa, I would never have imagined him to be such a selfless, giving lover, but even through his stress and anxiety he worked so hard on my pleasure that I wasn't sure where I was by the time we were lying together, sweaty, sticky and half-dressed, across the sofa. I couldn't have cared less that the song would be coming to an end soon, to be replaced by their warped intro music. I couldn't have cared less about anything in the world. It was all I could do not to burst into tears at the emotion of it all, to tell you the truth.

When I look back, sometimes, I wish I had.

I looked down at Papa, who barely seemed awake. He felt so small in my arms like this. For the first time, I was finding it difficult to reconcile the man I knew with the man who was about to enchant a bewitched crowd and make it feel as though he were about to sleep with every one of them, too.

He made to nuzzle into my chest but, in a second, seemed to realise the effect that might have on his already-smudged skull.

'Fuck …' he mumbled. Finally, a sense of urgency overtook him: giving me a swift kiss on my forehead, he started to push himself upright. 'I have about five minutes to get stage-ready. I'm not stage-ready, Charlie. I'm covered in cum.'

'And the rest.' I sat up too, kissed him again. 'It's OK. We can do a lot in five minutes. Is there anything I can do?'

He glanced down at himself. 'Maybe. Erm … this might be a bit weird, but could you go to the costume room and grab me a towel and a spare pair of pants? Please,' he added. 'Sorry. I just … these ones … they're …' He made a hopeless gesture, and I smiled.

'A bit rank? It's OK. I'm gone.' I grabbed my jeans from the floor and started to wriggle into them.

I could see the relief on his face through his smeared paint. 'Thank you. It's only two doors down, on the right.'

I found the room without issue, and it was unlocked: on a rail near the door were two complete spare outfits for Papa, right down to the spats, so I nicked an entire ensemble just in case. I had cried all over him on arrival, after all. The first pile of towels I found was black, unfortunately, but I thought I could probably dispose of that once he'd messed it up without anyone else seeing.

Chuffed at my good thinking, I left the room in a rush, only to almost crash into Papa Nihil.

'Charlie?' he said. 'Is that you?'

He wasn't even trying to hide the anger in his voice – I supposed the setting was pressing, and he'd been caught by surprise. I had to give him that. Thank God – or Satan, perhaps – that my mood was bright tonight.

'Hello, Papa Nihil,' I said. 'Nice to see you out and about again. I've just come to wish your son all the best for his last night of the tour cycle, but unfortunately we've spilled – uh – melted mozzarella all over his trousers, so we'll just get him scrubbed up then he'll be ready for the ritual. Will I see you later?'

Apparently lost for words, he simply glowered at me. I would have attempted to placate him, had time not been of the essence. And had I given one solitary shit about his opinion.

'OK! Have a good night,' I said, and I bounced past him back into Papa's dressing room.

_We won't see you later, you old bastard. If I have my way, your youngest son will never have to speak to you again._

I found his youngest son expertly touching up his skull paint, still dressed only in his undershirt: I tossed him the towel as soon as he looked up at me, and he beamed. 'Oh – thank you. It would've been an uncomfortable ritual otherwise.'

'I can imagine,' I said. 'Guess who I've just seen?'

'Do I have to guess?' He got up from his chair, face back in place, and made his way over to the small sink in the corner. I couldn't keep my eyes off him as he moved. My brief leave of absence had almost reset me, and looking at his now-flaccid cock, I had to wonder how long it would have taken for me to get him hard and whimpering underneath me again.

'No,' I said, 'probably not, actually.'

'Huh.' He blasted the towel with water, wrung it out, and gave himself a thorough rub down with it between his legs. 'And did he have much to say?'

'I didn't let him. I was far too concerned with getting that towel back here so you could mop up all that cum before you have to go on-stage …'

'I was going to say. You had to choose black, didn't you?'

'It was all I could find. I'll dispose of it, don't worry.'

'It's OK. A ghoul will collect it with the pants, whoever it is won't think twice about finding … well, anything. I've been pretty disgusting in the past.'

'You're pretty disgusting now.'

He paused mid-wipe to smirk over at me.

'Perhaps,' he said. 'But I draw the line at letting you wear that shirt into the ritual. Unfortunately we have made a bit of a mess of that, too.'

I glanced down with a sick, sinking sensation. Shit: he was right. And caught up in the fantasy of earlier, I wouldn't have minded, but now I had to adjust to the real world again …

'I haven't got anything to go over it, though,' I said. 'My biker jacket isn't designed to do up properly.'

Papa held up a now-gloved finger. 'I might have just the thing.'

He disappeared under his dressing table, into a small suitcase, to pull out a navy bundle of some description. It was only when he unfurled it that I realised that I knew exactly what it was.

'My hoodie! Shit, I forgot all about that … I lent you this the first night we met …'

He handed it to me and I buried my face in it. He'd had it washed. It smelled of the same detergent that undoubtedly washed his stage outfits, something fresh and intense. It smelled, in short, like him.

'You had better put it on,' Papa said, pulling on his own trousers. 'Before I take it back. I kept it around to remind me of you. I suppose I don't need anything to do that for me any more.'

I spent quite a long time 'lost' inside the hoodie as I pulled it over my head, then, for fear of Papa seeing the tears in my eyes.

By the time I emerged, he was fully dressed. Mitre and all.

'How're you feeling now?' I asked him, wondering if I dared even as I spoke. I didn't want to ruin the night. It almost felt as though it should have been ending. But he gave me the slightest quirk of a smile.

'You know how I'm feeling,' he said. 'You know me better than anyone in the world.'

My Papa.

Just a couple of hours, and if I had my way, we would be on the road to somewhere peaceful where we could make up for the lost months I'd cheated us out of, thanks to Nihil's scheming. What could we have had, if not for that night? Where would we be right now, if I'd made it into his flower-strewn hotel room in Nashville?

No. It didn't matter. I'd made it here, now, and we had whatever was left of both of our lives to fill with one another.

I just beamed up at him, and he gave me a wink.

'Papa,' I said, and I took a deep breath. ' _Jag_ _ä_ _lsk_ _ar_ _dig.'_

His smile turned nervous. 'I'm sorry, what?'

I hadn't been ready for that reaction: I felt my cheeks flush at the prospect of having to elaborate what I'd thought was going to be a very in-the-moment statement. 'It's Swedish? You know, like … we're in Sweden?' He shook his head in mock exasperation. 'Hey! You throw random Italian into conversation all the time.'

'Yes, but I'm Italian!'

'Well … sorry. I suppose you'll have to look that one up after the ritual.'

'I suppose I will, Charlie. Say it again?'

I inhaled deeply. ' _Jag_ _ä_ _lsk_ _ar dig._ '

' _Jag_ _ä_ _lsk_ _ar dig …_ '

There was a knock on the door, the same firm and sharp knock Secundo had given earlier.

'Terzo! Charlie!' Yes, that was his voice. 'Get yourselves decent. The start of the ritual is imminent and Nihil is already beside himself with fury …'

We glanced at one another. His amused smile mirrored my own.

'On this night of ritual,' he said – then he wrapped one arm around me before pulling me to him for one, last delicious kiss. 'Go and watch from the crowd. Enjoy yourself. I will see you later.'

'See you later,' I breathed.

His impatient brother flung the door open, and I wouldn't have put it past him to drag Papa out himself if he hadn't already been on his way. I watched him leave, still in a sort of daze, and Secundo gave me an amused once-over before following him in the direction of the backstage area.

Phil was waiting to one side. I met his intense, green eyes, and when they crinkled, I was sure he was smiling at me.

'How did it go?' he asked.

I bit my lip and dropped my gaze to the ground. How I was able to do the thing with no embarrassment, yet not talk about it without flushing, was a source of endless wonder to me.

'Really, really well,' I said. 'If you know what I mean.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know if I'll be able to update WJHTFITT to a high enough standard this weekend, so please don't be too disappointed if a new chapter doesn't appear for a little while! There's been a lot on chez moi. I'm sorry. Thank you for all your loveliness and patience, anyway, precious ones


	24. The Party is Over

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The last ritual of Papa Emeritus the Third's reign.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so, so sorry.

Phil and I stood to one side of the crowd.

We could've pushed further forward, if we'd wanted to. The place was full but I knew people were sneaky and could shove and weave their way to the front of shows even when they were packed out. And part of me, of all the rituals I'd been to, wanted this one to be the one I experienced from the front. To have him so close to me that I could almost touch him, to remind him that I _had_ touched him, and would again if he could only wait the duration of the show.

But, more pressingly, my presence might have given him strength to finish the show. I might have been a link to those nights we talked things through, when I read him the wonderful Ghost reviews or clung onto him in the Gulf of Mexico or kissed him on the bank of the Cumberland. If he could have noticed me every now and again, I might have been the confidence boost he sometimes needed, and the threat of his father's judgement of his time as frontman might have melted a little bit each time he saw me.

I thought better of it, though. The fans here only got their hour or so with him. Once tonight was over, I was going to have as long as I dared imagine.

Phil and I, from our less crowded position, also had the advantage of being able to just about talk to one another.

'How was he, then?' Phil said. 'When you explained?'

I watched Papa as he strode from stage left to stage right to serenade the fans on that side: phones rose from the silhouetted sea of heads to get the best shot they could.

'He was too good to me,' I said. 'I fucked up really badly, and I think he forgave me a bit quicker than I'd have forgiven him, if it had been me.'

'No,' Phil said. 'I don't think he's forgiven you too quickly. I think he just knows exactly what his father is like.'

It almost pained me to turn away from the show, but I needed Phil to see me – and see how serious I was.

'That's precisely the problem we think we might have,' I said. 'So … I don't know how else to say this. I need a huge favour from you.'

'OK. I mean, it depends on the favour …'

'I need you to bring the Saab to the stage door after the ritual and drive Papa and I away for a while. I think he needs a rest from the criticism of the clergy after all this.'

It was funny, how expressive ghouls could be with just their eyes and their body language. I saw the sigh he heaved, and I saw that it was totally in sympathy.

'Of course,' he said. 'Leave it with me. Don't worry.'

And in the darkness of the crowd, he found my hand.

*

We were still clinging onto one another when they appeared onstage during Monstrance Clock.

Papa was just doing his thing. He was standing at the front of the stage, conducting the crowd in a rousing chorus. The show had been wonderful. They always were.

Then there was a stirring in the crowd, as a handful of people began to register that two men, clad in black, were making their way towards him. Mid-song, they seized him by each arm. My scream was lost in so many others as they dragged him away, but my scream might have been the only one of genuine terror. For the fans, this could have been part of the show.

I turned to Phil, who looked worryingly confused, his eyes still fixed on the stage – I followed his gaze to see Papa Nihil, making his way onto the stage with some difficulty.

It was then that I knew this was not part of the show.

' _La festa è finita. Il medioevo comincia ora,_ ' he wheezed. On-stage, frail as he was, he had never looked more ominous.

Phil's continued confusion was evidence that he, too, had no idea what Nihil had just said. Even still, I had to ask. I had to be doing _something._ I think, looking back, I wanted some sort of assurance even though it was very obvious he would be unable to give me any.

'Phil …' I choked, but he just shook his head.

And the dazed confusion made way, instantly, for white-hot rage. Where was Papa? What was Nihil planning on doing with him? I was screaming before I realised it, words I wasn't sure I was forming with conscious thought. I surged forward, but almost as soon as I broke away from Phil's loose grip on my hand, both of his arms were around my waist, and I jerked as he clamped down on me.

' _No_ ,' he growled, into my ear: I thought he was trying to threaten me at first, but then I realised I could hear his voice shaking. 'Whatever he's doing, he'll do to you, too, if you interfere.'

'But he can't –'

'But he _is_. And you can't do anything without making it worse. Trust me. I know what he's like.'

He was right. And not just because he'd known Nihil longer than I had, but because I did know Nihil. And if he was really drawing a line under Papa's career like this, my bursting in on the scene would do nothing but enrage him.

'We …' I was sobbing, now. The crowd around us were mesmerised by the show, but we might well have been standing in total blackness for all the attention I was paying. 'We need to find him, Phil, we need to … we can't just …'

He still had his arms firmly around me. I couldn't turn to look at him any more, but I could feel how laboured his breathing was. In my anguish I'd forgotten that as I'd watched my lover dragged from his position, he'd watched his friend.

'The stage door,' he said. 'It's probably our best bet. Come on …'

We turned to sprint out of the front of the venue, and he led the way to the back – even before I saw the door, I saw the ghoul guarding it. He was big. Imposing. He had his arms folded, but when he saw Phil, they relaxed.

'Aether,' Phil panted. 'What the fuck is –?'

Aether gave me a cursory glance, but it didn't intimidate me, somehow. 'Is this –?'

His accent surprised me. It wasn't all that different from my own.

'Charlie, yeah,' said Phil. 'Papa's … friend.'

I resisted the urge to scream that I was, in fact, a lot more than that, but Aether nodded at me.

'You need to get yourself home as soon as possible. You aren't safe.'

I wasn't safe? Who the fuck cared? Papa definitely wasn't, and that was what I needed to deal with. 'But Papa –'

'Phil and I will try and take care of him,' Aether said. 'But I don't think you'd be a welcome presence in here at the moment, unfortunately.'

I did try to protest. I even tried to run into the venue again, but Aether was bigger than me, and much, much stronger. As far as possible, his grip was reassuring, but firm: after a minute I collapsed in his arms, sobbing and exhausted.

'He's right,' Phil choked out. I was numb to most sensation now, but I could just about feel him stroking my back. 'I'm sorry, Charlie, but you need to get out of here.'

I wouldn't have gone, if Phil hadn't physically put me in a taxi. He sent me off without instruction, just the clergy credit card he used to hire and fuel cars.

There was no time for a proper goodbye. That was the worst of it. I'd been so eager to erase the memories of the night I spent sobbing in the back of his car in Nashville, but his true last memory of me – if he's even around to have memories, I still don't know – is my tear-streaked face peering out desperately from the window of a taxi.


	25. PS

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> OK ... let's get this over with.
> 
> We all know how it plays out, anyway, right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a teeny, tiny little tie-up. I hate everything about this and, again, I am so sorry!

_April 30 th, 2018_

Luckily, that day, Laura was up for a visit.

She only wanted a break during the Easter holidays. We'd been out hiking in the hills surrounding my house, where I'd spent most of the day teasing her from being from the wrong side of the Pennines to compensate for the fact that she was much fitter than I was. We'd eaten with my parents but we'd retired to my room in an attempt at recreating our Wembley flat. Laura lived in a house share now, and she swore it was nowhere near as fun as it sounded and that the reduction in rent was not worth the lack of me. We had Louis Theroux on. I'll always remember that. We were laughing at the ridiculousness of his Weird Weekends – until we weren't, and her voice was low when she said my name.

'Charlie …'

I glanced up: she was staring at her phone screen with her lips parted, and her eyes were beginning to swim. Had she had bad news from her family back home? Had her bedroom in Tooting flooded?

'What?' I scrabbled onto my bum, shuffling towards her. 'Laura, what the hell? Show me –'

But when I reached for her phone, she clutched it to her chest. 'I don't think you want to see this.'

As soon as she'd said that, I knew exactly who this news involved.

It was a wrestle to get her phone off her, but I did.

_Chapter Three: Back on the Road._

She just watched me as I watched.

There he was. My heart definitely skipped a beat or two on seeing his paint-free face. In some darkened room, playing Uno with his brothers. I'd only met one of them, of course, but I'd seen the videos. I knew who they were.

'Charlie …' Laura tried again, as the video went on. Her voice was thick and wet, but I ignored her, stemming my newly flowing nose on my sleeve.

By the time the video was telling me that I could 'meet' the Papas as part of the VIP experience on Ghost's next tour, I wasn't taking any of it in any more. Laura had both arms around me, and I was nothing more than a quivering wreck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story was, in the first instance, nothing more than a kick up the arse for me. I've spent much of the year out of work and initially that gave me a lot of writing momentum, but I ran out of that once I finally started to submit manuscripts to agents and didn't have much joy. I made myself write something that was only ever going to be a bit of fun, and it became One Way Ticket Now Returned. Swore down I wouldn't get into fanfiction and that it was just a one-off ... but here we are!
> 
> In case you were wondering, the title was taken from Speed of Light by Iron Maiden, because Ghost opened for them on the tour that supported the album, The Book of Souls, that that song was from. Sadly they didn't come to the UK with them, but if they hadn't brought them on the road, I don't think I would ever have been intrigued enough by them to tentatively type 'ghost band' into YouTube two and a half years ago.
> 
> I'm sorry we've left Charlie like this. I wanted the story to have an impact but I think I actually hate the impact, haha. So let's not close this off forever ...? We'll see. We shall see.
> 
> Love you all. Thank you for riding this one out with me, it's been a lot of fun xxx


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